


Our Secret

by Moonrose001



Series: Broken fruit, red juice [2]
Category: Marvel 616
Genre: Aftercare, Alcohol, Angst, Bondage and Discipline, Bottom Steve, Bottom Steve Rogers, Casual Sex, Comfort Sex, Crossdressing Kink, Depression, Dom/sub, F/M, Fisting, Hair-pulling, Hurt/Comfort, Lingerie, M/M, Medicinal Drug Use, Multi, Outdoor Sex, Pampering, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rough Sex, Sexual Assault, Sharing a Bed, Steve Rogers-centric, Sub Steve, Sub Steve Rogers, Suicide Attempt, Threesome, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Voyeurism, crygasm, for real this time, referenced child death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-31
Updated: 2016-04-12
Packaged: 2018-04-18 08:37:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 57,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4699397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonrose001/pseuds/Moonrose001
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>"Do you understand the amount of humiliation I feel when I have to call another day a bad day?"</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>At the same time Steve Rogers escapes Dimension Z without his son, another him escapes his own world to seek asylum in Steve's universe.</p><p>Something is different with this stranger, they all soon start calling Kan. He's guarded and silent, and somehow starts to become Steve’s shadow. This shadow is always with him, and when everyone is gone he starts to whisper, and soon Steve forgets that there’s a world outside their hazy daydream. They start learning each others' secrets; they start creating their own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Suspend

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, I know the tag session is a long mess, but I needed everything covered. Speak up if you want me to add individual tags on every chapter if you want to avoid any particular tags ^^'
> 
> Like the prequel, I’ve tried writing referred events in-between lines, but might not completely succeed. Therefore I will add a primer in the End Author Note in case ^^ Most of the things referred to doesn't have great importance though :)
> 
> Enjoy!

”Steve,” the muscular blond man’s voice deeply rumbles. His lips glance Steve’s temple, landing on Steve’s pulse. Steve has learned that the man uses his lips and his hands just like Steve uses his ears and eyes. The soldier’s lashes shiver briefly, tiny pearls of sweat rolling down his forehead and down to his eyebrows. ”Are you listening?”

Steve makes a low, confirming sound in his throat.

”Color,” the man asks. It’s barely a mumble, but Steve can hear the clear command in the word.

”Green,” Steve sighs, and straightens up, trying to show the man that he has Steve’s attention. ”What is it?”

The blond man meets his eyes. They’re sitting on Steve’s bed, their legs intertwined, chests touching every time one of them inhales deeply and their fingers are so tightly knotted together that their wrists are touching. It’s dark and the small sea of skyscrapers outside light up the room like a starry sky underneath them. It’s clean and tidy, but the smell of their bodies and their musk is heavy. Their smell is naturally very strong, and the room reeks of it in very little time.

“Do you like it when I pinch your nipples?” the blond man asks, his hands closing around Steve’s hips, his thumbs on Steve’s hipbones. His skin is a tanned golden against Steve’s pale complexion, his hair a paler shade and some inches longer. “You like it when I hold you tight.” In a sharp, sudden tug his hands force Steve’s crotch against the blond man’s own. Steve exhales shakily, his hands beginning to tremble, not knowing what to do with them. “Hold you down.”

Steve shivers at his words. Goose bumps spread on his skin like wildfire. He feels hot inside, but his skin is cold. He closes his eyes and leans his forehead into the man’s shoulder. “Yes,” he confirms.

The blond man nods. “I was thinking – and you don’t have to decide now – if I could tie you up. And use clamps on your nipples.”

Steve stiffens, blood rushing to his face, heating his cheeks all the way down to his chest. “Uhm.”

The blond man lets go of Steve’s hips. Steve sighs sharply at the loss and the blond man reaches up to rub Steve’s back in reassuring circles. “It’s so I can better take care of you.”

“I don’t know,” Steve says nervously. “Wouldn’t that … I don’t know. I have a lot of negative feelings about being bound. Captured? I’d … it’d feel like you were forcing me?”

The blond man carefully inspects his face. “How do you feel when I hold you down with my hands?”

Steve hears himself swallow a lump in his throat and takes a deep breath. “I guess it’s different. I feel like… Like you’re supporting me when you hold me down. Giving me help to receive the … the pleasure I’m not sure I’m strong enough to handle on my own.”

The blond man lets go of Steve’s hands to reach up towards Steve’s blond crown. The man runs his finger through the short locks, cradling Steve’s head against his shoulder like Steve was a child. “It’s gonna be that way, Steve. I’ll make sure to make it feel that way. If you’re bound, I can use my hands for other things. Be better for you. The bondage will help you lie still. It will hold you together, so you won’t fall apart. Make you compliant and at ease.”

Steve pulls his head back. Two identical pairs of eyes meet each other.

“How do you know?” Steve asks.

Kan smiles, gently touching Steve’s lips with his fingers. “I don’t. But take a chance, and let me in.”


	2. Shadow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Asgardian mead,” Kan informs as he takes back the bottle. He looks satisfied in some way, beaming as well, his skin flushed, his pupils dilated and a constant smirk around his lips. Were they always this red? “Thor just gave us a bottle. He’s such a nice guy.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story takes place directly after Captain America v7 #12 and I’m just going to wing it after that. If there’s anything you're not sure of, I’ll be happy to explain it further in the comments.
> 
> Enjoy!

**2 months before**

When Kan first shows up, there’s chaos; mostly because the transfer appears to be very intentional and, usually, that’s a bad sign. Also, he showed up in the heart of Atlantis, which is never a good idea.

However, he showed up with a very clear message from his universe’s Namor and enough Kree-Atlantean equipment for it to be obvious that Namor himself had sent him through the portal as some kind of escape hatch. Also, he’d been stabbed three times in the back, and his knees had been shot to shit. His lungs were punctured and most of his ribs were either cracked or broken. As soon as the portal closed, he’d collapsed and had been sleeping and getting nourishment through a tube. As someone had very determinedly tried to kill him, they decided to politely wait for him to recover before asking any questions. Steve suspects that Kan wouldn’t have gotten this treatment if it wasn’t because “Kan” was just a nickname, and Kan was actually the Steve Rogers from that other universe.

Namor didn’t want the other Steve staying in his kingdom and the other Steve wasn’t very eager to live at the bottom of the ocean either, so Avengers Tower it was.

At first, there is debate among the Avengers. Half of them think this scenario’s way too suspicious, but what can they do? Steve argues that if they send the guy back, the people out to get him might succeed in killing him. It would be their fault then.

They try to interrogate him, of course, but he’s not saying much, not even to Natasha. He says that someone is out to get him specifically and they have the Watcher as hostage. He had run across the planet, while the Avengers had fought to keep them off his trail, but they – whoever they are – had always reached him in the end. As a last resort, they’d sent him to another dimension, a place where the Watcher’s eyes couldn’t reach him. The Avengers agree that as soon as Frost or Summers have time they’ll come to examine him. Until then, they would just hope that this “Kan” (people had gotten confused on what to call them, since they both reacted to “Cap” and “Steve”, until the other Steve had told them to call him “Kan”. It was supposedly an alias he once went by and since it was the only one Steve hadn’t had himself, it stuck) is telling the truth and someone would come get him once the danger had passed.

Why the Avengers needed to protect Kan so badly, and why Kan hadn't been allowed to defend himself from danger losing his life, Kan wouldn’t utter a word about.

And then for some reason, Kan decides to glue himself to Steve’s hip and since most of the Avengers had considered offering him a break after Sharon’s death, Steve is outvoted and becomes the babysitter of this inter-dimensional traveler. Tony takes the Nuke-case, which Steve was about to take a serious look at, even though the billionaire has a million things to attend to besides running around after a crazy fascist.

While their names might be the same, there are a few physical differences as well. Kan’s hair is a little longer than Steve’s, and his way of moving is less of a march and more of a lurk. He glides when he walks, he speaks softly and eloquently, and he’s handsy in a way Steve fails to decide how to interpret. It feels friendly; Kan touches him so naturally and thoughtlessly that it’s hard for Steve to find it… sexual. It’s the places he touches Steve that makes him second-guess his thoughts. The placement of Kan’s hands often finds the small of Steve's back, his neck and wrists, his waist and his knees; the typical intimate places. He also has no regard for Steve’s “bubble”, leaves little to no space on the couch, greets Steve with touches rather than words. He’s like a shadow, silent and permanent and he doesn’t talk much.

It also feels like Kan might come from a different cultural background; the way he eats, what he eats, his behavior and way of speaking tell as much, so Steve just bears over with all the touching, not wanting to be rude. Maybe it’s just what people in Kan’s world do. And the man is in a tough situation; if what he has admitted so far is really true and this isn’t some trap (which experience tells Steve it properly is) the man must be devastated and Steve doesn’t want to make the transition in this world too hard for him. Besides, something tells Steve that Kan isn’t here to hurt them. Kan doesn’t show his emotions, but something tells Steve that the man just really wants to go home. Steve trusts his gut that this guy won't intentionally cause trouble.

But then, one day, a week into Kan’s stay:

They’re at the movies with Natasha, both Steve and Kan getting popcorn while she pays for their tickets. Some old fella cat calls Natasha before she gets to them, and very naturally Kan turns his head towards the fella with the hugest flirtiest grin and with the most flamboyant, lisping voice he calls out: “Hey Daddy, want some of this package?”

The man is taken aback by this 240 pound bulk flirting like a underage sex worker, and Kan continues: “Come on, I’ll suck your dick for twenty dollars.”

“Nasty fag!” the man angrily yells at him, but leaves when Kan takes one long, almost threatening step towards him, still with the huge grin on his face.

As soon as he’s gone, the grin drops and he passes Natasha her popcorn. Natasha and Steve exchange glances.

\----

A week after the picture, while Steve is taking rounds in the pool, Kan lets him know he wants to join. He pulls off his shirt, and his body almost completely matches Steve’s, save for some slightly different proportions (Kan’s waist is very narrow), and Steve’s chest has hair and the hair on Kan’s chest is so fine it’s almost invisible. That’s when Steve notices the necklace.

It’s composed by three, long, water-like silver chains, clasped together at the back of Kan’s neck. They hold 19 wood beads in pale colors of blue, red, green and yellow. In between the beads, three geometric bone-colored pendants hang.

This baffles Steve the most. Besides his dog tags, which hardly count as jewelry, he has never worn any kind of adornments. “Who gave that to you?” Steve boldly asks. Kan’s been clinging to him like an octopus the past weeks, so hopefully the directness won’t be too much.

Kan shrugs. “My husband,” he lets Steve know, sitting on the edge of the pool and dipping his legs in. They're tanned and the hairs on them are curly and hay colored. Now that Steve thinks about it, Kan really reminds him of a California beach model.

“Your…” Steve stammers and then shuts his mouth before something offensive comes out. It shouldn’t amaze him as it does. Kan is, after all, not him after all, and it’s not like Steve hasn’t noticed that he finds men just as attractive as women. He just never really thought it mattered, because he is only attracted to gender in a very distant way anyway, and … besides. People think Captain America is straight. And since Steve could always only envision a future with a woman, he has let that side of him be. “I’m sorry. That you had to leave.”

“It’s okay,” Kan assures, still it sounds like a lie. He flops his feet back and forth in the water. “It’s interesting being here.”

Steve tilts his head. “Is it very different?”

“Not much,” Kan replies. “Just the two of us. We ended up very differently. Don’t tell anyone about him; I don’t want people to know.”

“That you’re married to a man?”

Kan shrugs.

\----

There are places inside Steve that he’s not too happy to examine. They’re black holes in his heart, and they’re so deep and foreign that on bad days, they consume him with cold. Honestly they’ve been there for the longest time. He felt the first one when he had lost his very first men during his war. Ever since then, as teams had split and come together, as members had retired or lost their lives, as there had been more wars after the one that was supposed to be the last, the holes’ numbers had grown and their ability to devour him had become more efficient.

In the beginning they had been immobilizing, but these days he barely notices them. Instead he uses them to put his feelings to rest, to focus on the mission, on the present. It’s almost easier with them there.

\----

Steve often thinks about what would’ve happened if he had followed his gut and not fallen into Zola’s trap that day. If maybe Sharon hadn’t wanted to propose to him, he wouldn’t have ended up meeting up with her for a mission they barely knew anything about. If they hadn’t been together, Steve wouldn’t have ended up in Dimension Z. Ian would have grown up and not be free but he’d have his sister, Jet. He’d have his life. And maybe Steve would’ve met him and only seen Zola’s little soldier; maybe Steve would have to kill him, but hopefully he could get away with getting Ian in jail. Maybe Ian and Jet would do penance together; maybe they could become happy and Steve could go on postponing settling down and break up and make up with Sharon like always.

Because Steve has long since given up on the thought of retirement. Starting a family. Every time the shield was passed on, something bad always ended up happening. Nasland was killed within a year, Mace could barely take a decade (and that was a somewhat calm decade, mostly dealing with causalities and security), while Isaiah Bradley…

He wouldn’t even start thinking about Bradley.

Or Burnside.

Those two shouldn’t even be in the same category at all.

Russo the gymnast. Scar the motorcycle gang leader. Some guys Steve hadn’t even known of because they hadn’t lasted a day.

Walker. Anti-Cap. God, Bucky. Worst was Roscoe Simons, whom the Red Skull had murdered. Crucified. Some sort of sick symbol of what would happen to people who couldn’t push back hard enough. Rickford would’ve turned into another Simons if Steve hadn’t observed him and chosen to take away the shield when he did. At least Bucky’s death turned out just to be a setup.

Point being, it’s not like Steve hasn’t tried to step down several times. And he’s tired. Okay. He wants to be there for Jet, but sometimes the world feels too far away and his vision gets foggy, he can’t see or feel anything and Ian is dead and it’s his entire fault.

He tries to move on, but who was he twelve years ago? Who was the person that didn’t pour his everything into one magnificent little boy? Who was he that did not know or love his son, who was he who didn’t have a son? Who was he that did not know this loss? These terribly big holes inside of him, tearing him open every morning, any given moment, drive him back to his bed when he just got out of his bed? Did he ever really understand grief until now? Who was he then who didn’t give up, who could stay fighting on the battlefield? Who hadn’t ever learned what it was like to finally break?

His son. He died. Because of Steve. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t want to retire. Maybe he’s actually well aware that the curse of Captain America is people always dying for him and that curse won’t leave him, not even when he becomes a nobody in a wasteland in another dimension.

No. He had to give something back, had to repay with his service for the burden he is. He’d rather stay fighting, then. Rather make up for it.

He can’t go see a shrink to get better; to become more motivated to fight. Too many of them have been spies, imposters. But sometimes the grief chokes him and Steve can’t comprehend how he’s supposed to keep living, nonetheless be Captain America. It’s not clinical depression; the serum keeps the chemicals in his brain too balanced for that. But it’s a 24/7 ache, a heavy weariness. He gets these intrusive, disturbing thoughts, variant in their ways of attacking, but always with the same message: that maybe it’s time for him not to be around anymore. He’s tired of fighting for the right thing; tired of lovers; tired of villains slipping away; tired of the media; tired, tired, tired. He’s tired of people dying. He’s tired of dying; he’s tired of someone eventually bringing him back.

He knows these thoughts aren’t what people want to hear.

\----

Kan is a shadow. In the morning he gets up early to make breakfast (salted cooked asparagus, black coffee, mangos and peaches boiled with sugar and water and some sort of bread he fries with honey and oil and nuts, probably very unhealthy but still very tasty) for the both of them. They run together. When they come back, Kan starts taking rounds in the pool and Steve boxes. Eventually they switch places. It should bother Steve to have someone with him all the time, but it doesn’t.

Thor drops by to check in, and they spar for a bit, Kan sitting in the background and reading a book Steve recommended. Eventually Steve goes to the Baxter Building while Thor watches their guest to drop off some paper copies for Tony, and when he comes back neither Kan nor Thor are anywhere to be found. He finds himself abruptly lonely, and he picks up the book Kan was reading and resumes from where Kan left the bookmark. He runs on the mile track for a couple of hours, before going to bed.

As he stares at the ceiling for the third hour of still not finding sleep, he hears a soft knock. He sits up and calls out.

Kan peeks his head in, before entering and closing the door behind him and locking it. He’s carrying a big, dark pink glass bottle, which he puts on Steve’s bedside table. Without talking to Steve, he walks around the room for a bit, checking the windows and bathroom. He’s so silent that Steve almost forgets him, and he wakes with a startle as he feels the dip on the other side of the bed.

“What are you doing here?” Steve asks. Kan is holding the bottle again and on his way to the middle of the bed he picks up the book Steve had been reading and throws it on the floor.

Kan settles besides Steve, and holds the bottle a safe distance away from his face as he pops it open. Green smoke comes out. He sniffs at it before taking a huge gulp. He passes the bottle to Steve.

“What is it?” Steve asks but hesitantly takes a gulp, just to make a face. It prickles on his tongue, feels like tickling bubbles down his throat and the scent in his nose is intensely sweet. The drink smells like jammed apples and nectar. The taste itself is enough to make him blink a couple of times. It tastes like sugar and honey mixed together.

“Asgardian mead,” Kan informs as he takes back the bottle. He looks satisfied in some way, beaming as well, his skin flushed, his pupils dilated and a constant smirk around his lips. Were they always this red? “Thor just gave us a bottle. He’s such a nice guy.”

Steve lifts a brow. “Yeah, it was. You drink?”

“Sure, when the occasions calls for it,” Kan informs and drinks before passing the bottle. Steve takes a sip but Kan looks expectantly at him, so Steve takes another two before giving back the bottle. His skin starts prickling.

“And this is the right occasion?” Steve asks.

“Sure,” Kan says, closing his eyes and leaning back his head.

An hour later they’re both a little drunk and Kan has convinced Steve to switch the radio channel and they’re listening to _Candyman_ and _Uptown Funk_.

“Alright, it might ruin his love life,” Kan admits, after a long rowdy discussion about whether or not Sam would accept the shield if Steve chose to give it over again. “How often did you talk about the job when you were with Sharon then?”

Steve smiles crookedly at him. “A lot. I guess?” he asks. “But my job _does_ fill a lot. And she cares about what I say. She’s interested, so it’s not like I’m boring her or anything.”

“Surely,” Kan complies and nudges him reassuringly. “But who can you _actually_ talk to?”

“Sam,” Steve answers, his smile fading as he stops himself from saying Iron Man. Tony and him are good, despite everything, but sometimes he can still feel the strain a bit. Maybe that’s why Steve hasn’t told him about Dimension Z yet. But he knows Tony has been trying to fix things in his own, stubborn way and that makes up for the hesitance Steve sometimes catches himself having.

Kan continues: “We aren’t in the 40’es anymore, Steve. Women can support themselves without men now. It’s not your responsibility to love her.”

It should hurt to talk about her. It does, but in a still way. Despite the stubborn hope he’d had in him when he had been stranded with Ian, a part of him had still started and finished the grieving process of losing people over there.

Steve shrugs and breathes out. “But I do… I do love her. She was very dear to me. And she loved me back.”

“But that’s Sharon though,” Kan says. His eyes get distant. “I don’t know about you, but my Sharon… She always wanted to be like Peggy. So much that she wanted to serve like Peggy did. Fight like Peggy. Have the same friends as Peggy. Love the same man Peggy loved. I just couldn’t be a part of that.”

Steve lies still for a second, letting the words sink in. Again, they should hurt, but they don’t. He had loved Sharon, fallen in love with her right away despite how he hadn’t known she was Peggy’s niece. With time he has wondered if that love had sprung, because of the pure nostalgia she awoke in him the first time he saw her in action. It’s undeniable that she had reminded him of Peggy back when the pain of her loss had still been fresh; they both had those round, blue eyes, the mouth that’d be beautiful and full if it wasn’t always thinned in determination, the same strut, the same guts. To this day it felt like his body knew all along, he just hadn’t caught up to the fact.

But even if he had developed his feelings for her because of how she made him reminisce, as time went by he had loved her as her own person. The way he loves all of them, he guesses: He admires them, is infatuated with their personalities, their creativity and wit. He had always thought that he just lacked the proper way of doing modern romance, his self-restraint and manners too big a part of him to feel the effect of desire and lust.

Now he starts to question that.

“I know where you’re going with this,” Steve sighs. “I know my relationship with Sharon had a lot of ups and downs.”

He remembers his love for Peggy; of course it had been different than with Sharon. It had been the first time he had been in a relationship where the feelings where mutual, and those days on his leave, where they had spent hours engulfed in each other, talking about marriage, about plans after the war, lying in their waste of desire for hours every morning, had been some of the happiest days of his life. He hadn’t been able to think about anything but her, even when he went to the field and was occupied with the thoughts of battle, his thoughts always seemed to stray to her. When she had died, he had mourned her deeply, despite how their romance had been dead for years. In a way, he still grieves her, but more as the life he still feels like he should’ve had.

His love for her had been one of the realest things he’s ever felt, and it hadn’t been the same with Sharon. He’s always thought that he had just loved them in different ways, but now he starts to doubt. Had they really only been together for so long because their jobs and goals were so similar? Had half of it really been the unity between two Avengers?

How can he not know? Why is everything such a confusing bundle of feelings and thoughts and things he should’ve thought about earlier? Where has he been when all of this happened?

Right. Consumed by the job.

Kan brings him back to the present when he wraps Steve’s hand in his.

“I love her,” Steve finally says.

“I know you do,” Kan confirms, squeezing his hand. He sounds so tender, so gentle. Steve turns his head to look at him. They’re lying on their stomachs on the bed, the half empty bottle on the table and Lesley Gore singing, “It’s My Party”, in the radio. Kan turns his face to meet Steve’s eyes. “Not being in a relationship with her is not giving up on her, you know.”

Steve swallows a lump in his throat, and tries to shrug, but it just feels like he’s drowning. “Too late. She’s dead. And so is Ian.”

Kan looks at him for a minute. “Ian?”

Steve clears his throat, not sure if he wants to say it. Only Sam and Jet knows about Ian. The only other Avenger members, who know about Dimension Z, are Banner and Pym, and besides them, a small SHIELD team and Maria Hill.

He’s drunk anyway, and he needs to get this off his chest. He just hopes to God his instincts are to be trusted regarding Kan. “I stole him from Zola. He was just a baby. Raised him on my own over there. He’s dead now.” He almost spits out the words, wanting to get them over with as soon as possible.

Kan’s eyes widen and he stares at Steve. For once his face shows clear emotion. Steve feels bad that the emotion is overwhelmed horror.

“I’m gonna hug you,” Kan states, his voice shaking and raspy. He reaches out and unceremoniously arranges Steve’s head in the hollow of his neck, intertwines their legs and folds his arms around Steve’s chest. Steve is unfamiliar with being held like this by another man, someone just as big as he is. For a moment he almost panics, wants to break loose, but Kan’s arms tighten and he can’t bring himself to fight anymore. He’s just so exhausted. It’s out now. Kan knows.

He takes a deep breath and inhales the closeness of another body, the feeling of being held and without expectations on him.

“Ian’s your son,” Kan says rather than asks, rubbing Steve’s scalp with his fingers.

Steve sniffs and only now realizes he’s crying. “Yeah.”

“How old was he?”

Steve clenches his eyes shut, trying to stop the sobs that are starting to rattle his lungs, his throat, his entire body. “12.”

Kan jolts like he was being stabbed. “I’m sorry.”

Steve shakes his head. He can’t talk, his throat feels too swollen, his heartbeat too painful and his eyes too hot and puffed, like they’re bleeding.

“Come on,” Kan prompts, squeezing the back of Steve’s neck. “Get it out.”

Steve doesn’t want to, but he has a feeling that he’s going to at some point anyway, so he takes Kan’s words as permission. The breath he feels like he has been holding since he came back is released and he starts sobbing, starts crying and it hurts. Hurts more than anything he’s felt in a long time. He can’t breathe, his lungs are trying to get out of his chest. His ribcage is too small and frail to contain them. They try to claw their way up his throat and he’s afraid they will release and break free, but Kan is holding him so tight that they can’t. His legs and arms feel numb, shaking uncontrollably against the sheets and his head throbs in a headache he can't experience without a head injury.

He doesn’t know for how long he lies there, but he knows that he chokes out: “I know I would have died, if she hadn’t killed him. I know she didn’t know who he was. But I … I can’t forgive her for killing him. I can’t forgive her for doing that and just dying, leaving me alone with all of this anger. I c-can’t forgive myself. It’s all my fault.”

Kan doesn’t answer, just rubs his thumb across Steve’s temple.

“I want to die,” Steve confesses.

Kan doesn’t answer. He’s just a shadow.

\-----

The next day Steve wakes up later than he has ever before. His eyes weirdly enough still feels puffed and red as he blinks at Kan walking into the bedroom with a tray of breakfast food portioned for one super soldier. Steve silently sits up and eats half of it.

“Eat, Steve,” Kan urges. “You need your strength.”

“I’m full, thank you.”

Kan looks at the tray. Steve hasn’t gone back to his full appetite and he blames the spare food stock in Dimension Z for it. You can’t delete 12 years of semi-constant hunger. Even Ian had stopped complaining of hunger, as young as he had been.

Now Steve feels sick. He shouldn’t have thought about that.

Kan looks at him in alarm and then gets Steve up on his feet. The sudden move makes Steve’s stomach heave and he hurries into the bathroom and throws up.

His eyes are red when he’s done. Kan wipes his hot face with a cool, wet towel and then wraps it around Steve’s head, and only when Steve feels the coolness, does he notice that his ears drums and ears are throbbing. Steve shouldn’t feel as sick and fevered as he does, nothing should be physically wrong him. Zola’s virus should be all gone. Kan holds his face upwards as Steve rests on the toilet seat and brushes Steve’s teeth. Steve blinks slowly and sloppily at him.

“Come,” Kan says and gets him up. “Let’s go watch some television.”

They go back to the bed and Kan turns on the TV. They watch Discovery Channel, how ant colony minds work. Steve is glad Hank isn’t there to comment on all the inaccuracies, which even Steve can pick out.

Steve’s head is on Kan’s thigh when Sam comes in his full uniform. He looks at the two of them, and Steve gets up on his elbows. Sam hasn’t dropped by since he and Stark started tracking down Nuke.

“Hey,” Steve greets and gets up. “How was the mission? Where is Jet?”

“She’s sleeping back at your apartment,” Sam reports and nods towards the exit. “Can I talk to your for a minute?”

“Sure,” Steve agrees and doesn’t miss Kan glaring at Sam.

“I’ll go hang out in the common room,” Kan says tonelessly before he makes his words a reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Primer:
> 
> To get the whole picture, I suggest you read[ Captain America v7 #1-10.](http://viewcomic.com/captain-america-001-2013/)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> [If you’re not familiar with all the people who wielded the shield, you can quickly scroll through this list](http://observationdeck.kinja.com/captains-america-the-many-who-carried-the-shield-1606450814)


	3. Bad Days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He sighs, breathing out and Kan rubs his solar plexus with the palm of his clean hand soothingly. Steve should move, let Kan wash his hand, but he can’t bring himself to. He feels dizzy. It’s too warm and smells too strongly of musk in here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kan makes his move. Smut ensues *_*

As soon as Kan has left, Sam reaches out his arms and pulls Steve in. Steve is stiff for a second, before he exhales and tries to relax with it; at the same time he prepares himself to put on a mask that’ll make Sam as less worried about him as possible.

“I’m so sorry, Steve,” Sam apologizes and Steve realizes he’s been saying it for a while. “I … I know you’re going through a lot, and … I’m sorry that you had to go through it on your own over there… I’ll be here more, it’s just this guy, Iron Nail, was the one who were controlling Nuke – we’re getting on it, don’t worry about it – I just wished I could - “

“Everything’s fine,” Steve assures. He doesn’t know why he’s lying, he never lies to Sam and usually doesn’t have a problem opening up to him, but for some reason he can’t stand the thought of Sam knowing how much Steve cried yesterday. Doesn’t want to tell him that Kan sleeps in his room now, his arms a sanctuary, a long needed shelter. “It’s rough, but I’m dealing,” he corrects himself when Sam looks at Steve like Steve thinks Sam is dumb.

With those words much of Sam’s guilt becomes sadness. He reaches out and squeezes Steve’s bicep. Steve feels guilty about Sam being sad.

Since when did he become so guilty about everything?

“I’m here for you, man,” Sam says, making Steve catch his eyes. “I always will be. If you ever need to talk or need anything at all, you’re going to call me, alright?”

Steve nods, looking down. He quickly remembers himself and looks up again to meet Sam’s eyes.

“Can you draw me a picture of him?” Sam carefully asks. “Of Ian?”

Steve abruptly feels sick. He turns his head away, careful not to move to not upset his stomach but Sam sways which has Steve throwing up anyway.

\----

Steve does end up drawing Ian anyways. He takes a picture of it and sends it to Sam, before carefully putting it in the bottom of a drawer. After that Kan gives him a few sips of Asgardian mead and they snuggle in bed.

“You don’t have any kids?” Steve asks twenty minutes later when it becomes clear neither of them are sleeping.

Kan turns around and faces Steve, before he nods. “I do. I have five with a sixth on the way.”

Steve looks at him in astonishment.

Kan smiles slightly at him. “I’ve been married with my partner for 20 years next month.”

Ah, Kan doesn’t age normally either.

“No Ian, though,” Kan continues. “Ian Rogers was our grandfather, right?”

Steve nods. “Came with Pop and Ma.”

Kan nods, blinking at the ceiling. “I do have a Sarah however,” he informs, again with that distant voice.

“Yeah?” Steve says, trying to sound encouraging. It should hurt, but it feels good to hear that at least one of them succeeded in keeping their kids happy, healthy and alive.

“She’s the fourth one. 10 years old. She’s a dreamer, that one. Didn’t get the serum to the same extent as the others.”

Steve looks at him, not surprised. “Is she ill like we were?”

Kan shakes his head slowly. “No. Just very skinny. Not as fast and strong as the serum should’ve made her.” He’s quiet for a long minute. He clears his throat, and turns to look at Steve. “First time my husband and I tried for a baby, it ended in a miscarriage.”

Slightly staggered, Steve reaches out and holds Kan’s hand. He doesn’t really know if it works, but it felt nice when Kan did it to him.

“I took it relatively well,” Kan tells him, his voice slightly more hoarse. “The surrogate, she did all she could to keep the child healthy. It wasn’t her fault or anything, it just happened. But uhm. My partner, he… it got really bad. And it never really went away.”

Steve looks at him. “I’m sorry.”

Kan shakes his head. “This is just me trying to say that I don’t blame you if you get tired. I don’t and won’t hate it, if you’re not strong with me. Not for my sake. You’re grieving and I’m welcoming that. Alright?”

Steve thoroughly inspects Kan’s earnest face, trying to find any trace of a lie or of ambiguity, but finds nothing. He looks away.

“Steve,” Kan says and he reaches out and knots their fingers into each other’s. It’s nothing compared to how close they’ve been lately, but it still fills different somehow.

So it doesn’t surprise him when Kan gets up on one elbow and leans in to kiss Steve’s forehead. Steve blinks up at him, silent and waiting for something, anything, and Kan pulls back to assess him. When Steve just meets his eyes, expectantly, Kan leans down again, lower this time, to kiss Steve’s brow bone. His thumb starts rubbing Steve’s temple. Steve closes his eyes and only then does Kan press a soft kiss onto Steve’s lips.

Steve sighs and then brings himself to say: “Listen, Kan, it feels like this is getting out of hand.“

Kan kisses the tip of Steve’s nose. “Forget everything for a second. Look at me.” He pulls back and meets Steve’s eyes. Steve is starting to understand how people won’t shut up about the blue of his eyes, because the crystal clarity in them is almost hypnotizing. “It’s just us,” Kan steadfastly reminds Steve. “No one but us.”

Steve closes his eyes again. Then he nods. Lets the black holes just be, lets the warm darkness consume him until everything goes quiet.

“Let it take you,” Kan whispers against Steve’s neck and Steve shivers. “It’s our secret.”

\----

Some days after, making out with Kan has become normal. Kan’s lips are milk and honey, warm and sweet and sooths every ache, makes you pliant and calm and warm inside.

It also looks like Kan seems less twitchy now that he can touch Steve in a more intimate manner.

“How would your husband feel about you kissing yourself?” Steve asks one morning. He should feel bad about not thinking about this before, but instead he sort of doesn’t really care. Perhaps he’s willing to ask now because it’s a good day. A good, lazy day.

“We have an open relationship,” Kan answers, braiding his own hair as he looks in the mirror. His hair has gotten quite long. It parts in the middle, the roots of it dark blond, transitioning into platinum beach-wavy locks around his shoulders. “Usually I ask, but I think my other self will pass his vetting.”

Steve frowns up at him. “That’s an unusual lifestyle.”

Kan shrugs. “We’ve always been this way. It’s not something people know though.”

“Is he also…?”

“Not really. I’m not sure if he will be in the future. When we … well, it’s a longer story, but before we got married, he dated another woman and me at the same time. But he’s since admitted that he’s demisexual, and other partners are unlikely.”

“Why?”

Kan shrugs, ties his braid with a hair tie and throws himself down on the bed, automatically reaching out to stroke through Steve’s hair, his other hand laying on Steve’s duvet-covered arm. “He barely has time for me and the kids. The only reason I have time is because I’m in the States a lot.”

“He lives overseas?”

“Yeah. He lives with the children and does his job from home.”

Steve nods thoughtfully.

“But don’t get me wrong, I don’t really have the time or opportunity to play with others either,” Kan shrugs. “I don’t have the wild lifestyle you’re imagining.”

Steve smiles.

Kan kisses Steve’s forehead. “Sorry, I should’ve said it before I kissed you. It wasn’t my intention to make you worry.”

Steve shrugs. “It’s okay. I should have asked right away.”

Kan rubs away some eye discharge around the rim of Steve’s left eye, before he softly kisses Steve’s mouth. “You feel up for a shower?” he asks.

Steve considers it and then nods before getting up and going to the bathroom. The shower is long-needed – he’s been skipping them on bad days. As always, the shower is quick and efficient and it’s cold, because Steve feels sweaty and hot all the time. Probably because he’s always in bed.

When Steve has pulled on some clothes, Kan knocks. Steve calls out his assent, grabbing his toothbrush.

“Is it okay if I shower now?” Kan asks.

“Sure,” Steve says and Kan undresses and walks into the shower stall. It’s not the first time Steve has seen Kan shower; they’re both soldiers and modesty is something trained away long time ago.

“Geez, you’re hairy!” Kan says as he steps out, looking at Steve’s hairy chest. He’s completely naked and Steve is nervous that even now, while Steve is half-naked and Kan is in his birthday suit, Kan won’t care about Steve’s personal bubble.

Kan dances forward and hooks his wet arms around Steve’s shoulders, but making sure not to connect the lower region of his body with Steve.

Well.

Irritated, Steve swats at him. “You’re making my shirt wet.”

And he had gotten this shirt dry-cleaned too. It’s the Italian button-down, the one he uses on date nights; no front pocket, with thick but long sleeves. Its cut is hard to get in the States, unless you get it tailored like Tony does.

It’s fine. He hasn’t even buttoned it yet, and he’s regretting allowing Kan at his open front, because Kan unabashedly puts the damp palm of his hand on the middle of Steve’s hairy chest and strokes it in circles. In another universe, Steve would say that Kan is pouting.

“You don’t have any yourself,” Steve says and turns around. It should feel weird with Kan standing nude like that, but Kan doesn’t look very embarrassed and Steve’s got pants and underwear on besides the opened shirt. “Wow, you’re smooth,” he confirms. Even his pubes, which are a bit blonder than Steve’s, aren't very thick and don’t curl nearly as much. “Like a baby,” Steve adds in a teasing tone.

Kan openly pouts now and then reaches forwards and squeezes Steve’s nipple. Steve jumps and squeaks in surprise.

“Well, at least I don’t have baby pink, swollen nipples,” Kan responds. True enough, Kan’s nipples are light brown and not nearly as bud-like and perky as Steve’s.

Kan’s eyes drift lower. “You know what would be funny.”

Steve narrows his eyes at Kan’s reflection. “Not our penis sizes.”

“Definitely our penis sizes,” Kan says. “Come on.”

“No,” Steve says, looking directly down at Kan’s soft cock. “We’re basically the same.”

“Basically?” Kan says. “What do you mean basically?”

Steve shrugs. “I think I have more foreskin.”

Kan blinks at him and then grins. “Can I see?”

Steve opens his mouth to say no and this time Kan looks perfectly prepared for it, and maybe that’s why Steve says: “Sure.”

Kan looks surprised for a second. Steve doesn’t move, so Kan hesitantly reaches forwards and buttons up Steve’s pants. He meets Steve’s eyes one last time, before pulling down Steve’s underwear. Steve’s stares down at his own soft cock, foreskin slipped down over the head further than Kan’s.

The airing system in the bathroom makes a low windy sound. The floor is slightly wet, and it’s getting warmer because of Kan’s hot shower. Steve has forgotten to put on his deodorant, and is starting to sweat with Kan so close by. The flush on Kan’s skin is starting to tamp down now that he’s getting dry and Kan licks his lips.

“Can I…?” Kan asks, finally looking back up at Steve. “Touch it?”

Steve nods a single time and Kan reaches out and closes his fingers around it. It makes Steve stand up on his toes, but not for long. He’s still cold from the shower and Kan’s hand is warm and big. His other hand softly pushes Steve closer, until they’re chest to chest.

Kan rests his chin on Steve’s shoulder, his lashes tickling the side of Steve’s neck. His hand examines Steve’s cock at a relaxed pace, and Steve shudders. It’s been too long – 12 years – since any other hand but his own has touched him, and lately he hasn’t felt up for it, so he feels pent up with too much squeamishness and nervousness and at the same time he feels sensitive and craving.

He starts to harden. Kan stops moving and straightens to look up at Steve. “Do you want me to…?” Kan asks in a hoarse voice, and then clears his throat. “I can get you off. I’d be happy to.”

Steve blinks at him. “I’m not sure…”

Kan lets go of his dick and Steve whines.

“You don’t have to bring me off in return,” Kan says in a soothing tone and puts both of his hands on Steve’s hipbones. “Don’t worry about it.”

Steve nods, slightly concerned but willing, and Kan turns them around, so Steve is facing the mirror.

“I just want to see you properly,” Kan rumbles. “Want to see your pretty pink tits.”

Steve involuntarily shivers and looks down at Kan’s hand, now gripping Steve’s cock and slowly starts stroking it. Steve’s cock is the kind that gets red right away and it used to embarrass him a lot. Right now, he does feel embarrassed by how desperate it looks, but hey, his dick is almost identical to Kan’s, so Kan probably already knows.

“Just relax, I’m going to take care of you,” Kan mutters close by Steve’s ear and his voice is deep and low and assuring, warm and full of intent. “I’m going to be good to you, Stevie.”

Steve’s hips jerk. Kan carefully rubs his crotch against Steve’s ass, pushing Steve’s hips forward and Steve’s cock thrusts through Kan's loose fist. Kan kisses and nips at Steve’s jawbone, one of his eyes staying on the mirror, meeting Steve’s, while looking at Steve’s cock, whose slit is now leaking with precum.

“Look at that,” Kan says and he sounds proud. “Already wet for me. Perfect.” He circles a thumb at the slit, spreads around the wetness of it and strokes languidly until Steve’s prick is completely wet and the smell is getting strong.

“You like getting wet for me?” Kan whispers and Steve feels like stomping on Kan’s naked toes, because Kan is drawing attention to the fact that he’s jacking Steve off and he’s going to talk dirty the whole way.

And the dirty talk is getting to him. That’s probably the most embarrassing part.

Kan’s arm locks around Steve’s torso, two fingers closing around a nipple and softly squeezing. Steve’s breath stutters and Kan’s hand cradles Steve’s dick, watching Steve’s face as he carefully resumes stroking Steve, whose balls are getting tight and knees are becoming weak and it feels even more intense than that time Rachel sucked Steve through three orgasms in a row. It's probably from the lack of sexual relations for the past twelve years making him so sensitive.

He whimpers. Kan shushes him and softly pushes Steve’s weight against his body. The corner of Steve’s shirt’s shoulder slips off and rolls down to his elbow. He stares at his bare, pink shoulder, shiny and warm as it tenses when Kan starts to stroke in a faster pace.

It feels good. Kan does it the way Steve prefers; hard pressure right beneath the head of his cock but the main focus on the shaft of it, because touching the head was sometimes too intense. Steve leans back, his eyes automatically closing and Kan’s other hand reaches up, briefly touching Steve’s open lips.

And Steve forgets everything for a while, just focuses on being good for Kan.

As he drops into this mindset, his body finally relaxes and all he's aware of how sensitive his flesh feels underneath Kan’s rough hands. Kan shoves his pants a little lower until they’re clinging to Steve’s thighs. Steve moans and Kan takes a handful of Steve’s ass cheek and fondles it, making Steve’s hips thrust forward.

His toes are curling and his eyes feel damp as he blinks at the ceiling; his cock is a throbbing hot piece of meat, and Steve distinctly hears himself make a low moaning sound in his throat, his figure swaying.

Kan’s hand at Steve’s face falls again and squeezes Steve’s nipple harshly and Steve groans. Kan does it again, speeding up his other hand and Steve whispers: “Yes, yes, so close, don’t stop.”

And Kan squeezes his hand tighter, strokes Steve quicker and Steve cries out, his orgasm finally crashing through, spurting out of his dick. The pleasure feels so intense that the sensitivity afterwards almost hurts, and he feels too exposed. His knees are wobbling; his toes are barely touching the floor because so much of his weight has tipped onto Kan. His abs are sweaty and Steve stares in the mirror as his hairy chest breathes heavily, one nipple looks bitten and red, his neck is sweaty and his fingers are twitching.

He sighs, breathing out and Kan rubs his solar plexus with the palm of his clean hand soothingly. Steve should move, let Kan wash his hand, but he can’t bring himself to. He feels dizzy. It’s too warm and smells too strongly of musk in here.

Kan lifts his hand and opens his mouth, his tongue peeking out to taste a drop of seed. Steve stares sluggishly at him and then opens his mouth as well. Kan willingly reaches out and lets Steve lick up a drop. He hasn’t tasted seed before, not even his own, but he supposes it’s not so bad.


	4. Dive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I want you,” Steve whispers, afraid that the walls will hear.
> 
> “You have me,” Kan complies and Steve has time to see his teasing smile as he pulls back, before Kan pulls him into the water.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My dear beta is on a long-needed holiday, nerding in Tokyo, so this chap won't be betaed. All mistakes are mine.

Tony doesn’t like Kan. That much becomes obvious as he says that he wants to spend a night doing tests on Kan, while eyeing the man up with a nasty glare. Kan pretends he doesn’t notice and when Steve and him are separated, he only gets to stroke Steve’s shoulder lightly before being pulled away.

It abruptly feels lonely and Steve fears that Tony knows – after all they did it in his house – but they have privacy protocols in place and Tony wouldn’t. Shouldn’t. So Steve tries to kill time by getting some work done, rereading current files which memory has faded over the past decade, and then he reaches files he has gotten the past few days, catching up with what the Avengers are doing lately. After that he goes to the gym and runs for two hours, before going back to bed.

He wakes up 6 in the morning with his window being tapped. His window hasn’t been tapped, since Spiderman needed a shower and some deodorant for a job interview and he opens it, expecting the Spider needing another favor, but it’s Kan sitting on the window sill, clearly haven climbed his way up from his guest room downstairs. He’s wearing worn out jeans, a plain white T-shirt and a black leather jacket, his hair a ruffled bird nest. He smells like hole in the wall bars and he has a black eye, which is clearing up.

“Kan, what happened?” Steve asks, suddenly very concerned even though he’s used to his people coming home with worse.

Kan shrugs. “Accident in the lab,” he informs. “Tony knows I sleep in here.”

“Oh,” Steve utters. “Has he…?”

“No. His robots have detected me not sleeping in my room.”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing. But he made sure to follow me to my room,” Kan informs as he hangs his jacket and throws his T-shirt on the floor, before getting out of his jeans and crawling into bed. Steve wrinkles his nose by the thought of the smell, which is clearly going to cling to his sheets. Between getting escorted to his room and coming here, Kan has clearly been somewhere else. “I’m going to sleep. Is Sam going to run with you today?”

“Still chasing Iron Nail,” Steve informs. He knows he can’t sleep in but the jerk-off yesterday had felt so good, and he might have a little more time to stay in, before his body starts craving activity. He joins Kan underneath the duvet, and the smell isn’t as bad as he thought. Kan welcomes him by hugging him, cradling Steve’s head and kissing his forehead several times, before moving on to Steve’s brow bone and temple and cheek.

“You’re so handsome and sweet,” Kan compliments, and it sounds sincere. Steve still cringes, automatically moving away from the other man’s embrace. It feels like being mocked, all of the sudden, this blatantly misplaced praise. It feels like a lie, an unwrapped sticky lollipop on the side street.

“What´s wrong?” Kan asks, as Steve quickly pecks him on the cheek and rolls to the other side of the bed with his back turned.

“I don’t know,” Steve says and shrugs.

He can tell that Kan is looking at him, but the guy doesn’t say anything. He lets Steve have his space and they spend long minutes breathing in unison, both aware that they’re awake and still not saying anything.

7 am, Kan says: “I want us to use traffic lights.”

Steve is not too removed from the civilian life that he doesn’t know what that is. Red for stop, yellow for wait, green for go, when words lose their meaning in the heat of sex.

“Alright, that sounds good,” Steve agrees, though he doesn’t really care.

Kan turns around at him. “If you could’ve used a color before, what would it have been?”

Kan doesn’t have to explain when ‘before’ was. Steve shrugs in return. “Red?”

“Would you please look at me?” Kan demands firmly.

Steve sighs and rolls onto his other side, so he’s facing Kan. The sunlight has transferred from a pink red to a golden orange.

“I’m here for you,” Kan reminds him, reaching out to touch Steve’s face, before quickly pulling his hand back. “I can give you everything you need and want. You just need to tell me what it is.”

And Steve doesn’t know what to say, because he doesn’t have a clear answer. He doesn’t know what about being praised he doesn’t like, so the words just end up stumbling out: “I don’t deserve pleasure.”

Kan doesn’t look surprised.

“I don’t deserve being called handsome or a good boy,” Steve continues. “I don’t deserve feeling good just because you want me to feel good. I want to be close to being good, but not close enough to be encouraged. If I have to be a good boy, I want to work for it. I want to prove that I can be good if I try hard enough. Otherwise I don’t want to hear it.”

Kan tilts his head, looking thoughtful. For a long second he almost looks a large cat, assessing his prey, musing if it’s hungry enough to hunt. Then Kan slowly nods. “Is it that you want a challenge or is it that you want salvation?”

They talk.

\---

Their first time, despite all their planning, quickly escalates. It’s… Well, it feels wrong to say that it’s planned, because it’s not like they had an exact date and time written down, but it is something they work up to. It is Kan making them stay in bed for a little longer than usual, it is Steve deepening their kisses intentionally, it is their hands getting familiar with each other’s bodies.

One afternoon, when Steve has taken a shower after his morning run, he finds Kan in the private pool. Not the team pool, the pool Tony seldom uses for his own guests. Steve has gotten a pass to use it, when he needs to be alone, but he always felt like he shouldn’t. Tony had given and done so much for the team; let him keep his stupid pool to himself.

However, Kan clearly doesn’t share this sentiment. Steve joins him with his sketchbook and rolls up his sweats so he can sit with his feet dipping in the water while Kan swims. Steve spends some time trying to catch the reflexes on the water on paper, and eventually Kan stops taking rounds and swims to Steve. His warm hands close around Steve’s ankles, using Steve as an anchor to stay afloat, and he puts his chin on Steve’s kneecap. Steve reaches out and drives his fingers through Kan’s wet hair. Kan leans into it, his lids lowering and his shoulders relaxing, reminding Steve of a cat being petted.

He’s still looking at Steve through his lashes and Steve puts down the sketchbook. Immediately Kan uses both of Steve’s knees as leverage so he can peck Steve’s lips and Steve supports Kan’s weight with both of his hands braced around his arms.

“I want you,” Steve whispers, afraid that the walls will hear.

“You have me,” Kan complies and Steve has time to see his teasing smile as he pulls back, before Kan pulls him into the water.

Steve hasn’t ever swum here before, but he notices right away, as their figures disappear in the deep, that the water is warmer and tastes less like chlorine. Kan’s hands hook around his waist and he pulls them together tightly. His hands settle on Kan’s cheek and Kan dips in his tongue. After all their making out, tongue has never played a big part, but now it feels like just the right kind of invasion, the right kinda taking and by the time they get back to the surface, Kan has already sucked on Steve’s tongue.

Steve feels dizzy and can’t quite open his eyes all the way and Kan keeps peppering him with kisses, Steve passively letting himself feel it, until Kan’s mouth eventually goes lower.

“Color?” the other man huskily checks in.

“Yellow,” Steve whispers. “Not in here.”

Kan nods and they pull themselves up from the pool. They take the stairs so they won’t run into anyone and also get to Steve’s room directly, and as soon the door has closed and locked behind them, Kan slips off his swimming trunks and helps Steve gets out of his clingy, wet clothes. When they’re both naked, Kan tenderly checks Steve’s color again. When he gets Steve’s consent once again, he rather roughly pushes Steve onto the bed. He kneels down, and strokes the warm palm over his head over Steve’s crutch a couple of times, before lowering down to lap Steve’s balls with his tongue. Steve shivers and groans, the hotness of Kan’s flat tongue sending flares of heat into his dick and through his abdomen. Kan licks at Steve’s balls for a minute or two, before softly, oh so gingerly, kitten licking his way up the length of Steve’s cock.

Steve groans again, fighting not to grind against Kan’s face and Kan looks up at him with a steamy stare, his long, brown lashes clumped together and his pupils dilated so much his eyes almost look black. He kisses Steve’s hipbones as brushes the duvet to the side and then almost coyly sucks the head of Steve’s cock into his mouth. Steve groans deeply and Kan’s stare stays on him, keeps their eyes locked as he slowly downs Steve. Steve can barely look at it, has always been bad at being pampered by his partner and watching it happen, especially when the lights are on, but Kan doesn’t get that, just starts sucking Steve off, his mouth tight and swallowing, while his hands are clenching Steve’s ass cheeks.

When Kan winks at him, while dipping his tongue at Steve’s slit, Steve throws his head back, both in ecstasy and embarrassment.

When he looks back down again, Kan has closed his eyes, and he looks so content and wholesome like this, like this is what he has been waiting for, this is where he wanted to be.

He looks beautiful. Steve feels something tense and aching melt into a wet puddle in his chest and he reaches out to run his fingers through Kan’s hair. Kan leans into the touch and sighs as if he’s only starting to relax now too. Kan lets go of Steve’s dick, only to work his way up, grip Steve’s hipbones and start kissing his neck and jaw. The pressure of his weight is light, non-pressuring and Steve spreads his legs and pulls him in tighter.

It’s new. It’s different. Kan isn’t a soft, smaller figure, dipping into the hollows of Steve’s body. He is big, just as big as Steve, and his flesh is hotter than Steve’s. Even his waist and thighs are a little thicker, which confuses Steve for a moment, because he reminisces that they were exactly the same when Kan arrived. Has Steve lost weight? He normally doesn’t check his weight but –

“Do I feel good, Stevie?” Kan interrupts Steve’s thought stream.

“Yeah,” Steve sighs and it’s true. Their cocks are hard, hot and leaking in between them, making every slow grind an easy slide.

Still, Kan takes his time to let Steve get used to it. He holds Steve still and plays with Steve’s tongue with his own, bites his lips, makes Steve engage in the kiss, makes it hard for Steve to keep up, until Steve gives up and stops kissing back and Kan groans, continuing to deeply kiss Steve’s passive mouth, only making it rougher.

Kan finally moves away and Steve dazedly blinks open his eyes.

Kan leans in and grips Steve around the chin. “I’m mad at you, Stevie.”

Steve can feel his eyes widen in confusion. “I haven’t done – “

“Quiet!” Kan snaps. “I don’t want to hear your excuses.”

Steve frowns. “But –“

Kan slaps him across the cheek and Steve’s head snaps back. It was a serious warning hit; his cheek feels hot and throbbing. Steve is bewildered of how to make it better; to get back the easy tender mood which just evaporated.

“Do you have anything to say, Stevie?” Kan harshly asks.

“Uh,” Steve stutters, still taken aback. “I’m sorry.”

“You should be,” Kan tells him and Steve closes his eyes, while nodding. He feels hot tears of shame well up into his eyes. He knows from the bottom of his heart, that this is the right thing. This is where Steve deserves to be; here no one will look at him in naive admiration, with adoration. He’s a bad person, a bad boy, and finally someone sees that and Steve can allow himself to feel the proper remorse.

When Kan’s hand strokes his cheek, it takes him by surprise. “Color?” Kan asks and Steve opens his eyes, already feeling dizzy and slightly dismayed that Kan pulled him out of the scene so soon.

“Green,” Steve replies anyway.

Kan nods and pulls back.

“So,” he resolutely sighs. “What are you going to do to make it better, Stevie?”

“I …“ Steve sinks. “I don’t know, Kan.”

“Will you let me do whatever I want?”

“… Yeah. Yeah.”

“I’m sure there are some ideas in your head of what you want me to do,” Kan inquires and starts to stroke his hard dick. The display makes something in Steve jolt, because one thing was cuddling, one thing was nudity, one thing was both, but Kan is hard for him. Kan is making Steve aware of how desirable Kan thinks Steve is.

“I don’t know, Kan,” Steve repeats. “I’m…”

Kan looks at him. He stops stroking and reaches out his hand where a bit of precum is glistening on his hands. “Lick it.”

Steve stares at him wariness and Kan smacks him over the other cheek with his other hand, this time without giving any warning. Steve can feel his other cheek start to pinch and tighten as well. He’s gotten worse beatings than this, but for some reason, here and alone with Kan, he feels the impact a lot more directly. He’s vulnerable, he’s sitting here naked and passive, and Kan is taking advantage of that and hurting Steve. He’s crossing a line Steve didn’t even know he had. It feels intoxicating and like being shredded open at the same time.

Steve leans forward and licks a thick stripe over the precum. It tastes salty and of chlorine.

“Good boy,” Kan says, not really approvingly, but rather like a statement. This part had been non-negotiable. Kan wouldn’t just punish him and leave. He would make Steve fight, make Steve work, and he’d hurt Steve, but he also needed to reward Steve and let Steve obtain Kan’s satisfaction during a play.

When they had talked about it, Steve hadn’t so much understood it, but now the praising words are a cool relief and Steve feels the need to earn more.

“I’m gonna take your ass next,” Kan decides. “You ever had someone in your ass before, boy?”

Steve shivers and suddenly feels afraid. Kan locks his hands around Steve’s ankles. Steve wants to pull away. “No.”

“You sure?” Kan asks, pulling Steve in so they’re abdomens are only a few inches away from each other, and Steve’s thighs are resting around Kan’s waist. “You sure you haven’t let anyone in there?”

“No, I haven’t, Kan,” Steve says.

“Good,” Kan says, sounding satisfied. “I can be the first to shove my thick cock up there, getting you while you’re still tight and fresh.”

Steve stops breathing.

“It’s gonna hurt,” Kan lets him know, but he sounds none-caring. “But it’s going to feel so good. You’re gonna try to get away and try to make me fuck you harder at the same time. There’s no other feeling like it – being bred like that, being taken. You’re gonna feel so small and so out of control – and then you’re mine. You’re all mine, and everything about you is _mine_. You understand that?”

Kan’s hands creep up to Steve’s ass, and two already slick fingers nudge at Steve’s hole. It makes Steve tense and move himself in a half-aborted move to get away, but also to give Kan’s hand more space to do their job.

“And it’s going to be all mine – after you’ve been fucked by me, it won’t feel the same with other people,” Kan continues in a husky voice as his fingertips keep circling Steve’s hole, getting it slick and so sensitive it almost aches. There are some nerves down there, Deadpool had once randomly said in the middle of battle. Steve hadn’t thought too much about it, but already sensitive nerves and Steve’s overall enhanced sense of feeling…

Kan must know what it does to Steve.

“You’re gonna be a cat in heat, a desperate slut for it,” Kan continues and then slips one of the fingers in to the first knuckle. Steve groans. It feels weird. So very weird. Like he is going to take a shit weird.

And Kan pushes in another finger. It feels less weird this way, oddly enough; it feels more tight and fulfilling than intrusive, and when he twists around his fingers and pokes, it feels –

Like lightning. It’s sudden and intense and Steve’s flagging erection stiffens. When Kan reaches down to start stroking Steve’s cock, it only becomes better. For a minute, Kan works in silence, feeling around Steve’s inner walls and pushing that spot in-between strokes and Steve is panting, staring at the man in something that feels like awe.

Kan eventually gets him loosened up and he is not nice about it; he curses at Steve for being too tight, his worthless uptight virgin hole. His hands though are far less cruel, gentle, and patient. When he is done, he rolls Steve unto his fours and presses Steve’s face into the sheets, lifts up Steve’s ass. He fists Steve’s hair and pushes in with no pause and no gentleness at all, immediately starting to pound him.

At first the pounding doesn’t feel good at all, and Steve suspects that it’s intentional. Punishment isn’t supposed to feel good, it’s supposed to make you angry and scared and brave at the same time, and that’s what it does. Something in Steve breaks and when Kan can hear Steve’s soft pleadings to please let up, he changes the angle of his hips and his cock strokes a hot stripe against Steve’s hotspot. Steve yowls into the sheets, the transition from something unpleasant into something very enjoyable, so abrupt it’s almost too much.

“Yeah, that’s what I like,” Kan drawls, the sound of skin smacking skin the only sound besides Steve’s panting. “Do you feel that? Do you feel me inside you, Steve? Tell me how it feels.”

Steve can only groan and Kan’s pounding unbelievably gets harder. “I-it feels like,” Steve says. “Like…”

Kan smacks him over his ass and Steve hisses.

“Like being owned,” Steve finishes.

And it should hurt to say, it should make him reluctant, but it feels pure. It feels pure and clean and for now he doesn’t remember what it’s like to be upset all the time and maybe those two things are really the same.

It feels like nothing and everything. It feels like emotions taking over, but without their wrath. It’s a feeling of flying and it tastes like mercy.

Kan doesn’t let Steve come. He slams his hips in, and comes with a soft groan, but he doesn’t let Steve come. Steve is mad at first, needy and stubborn, but after a harsh spanking and Steve sucking Kan off and swallowing down Kan’s come, all with one of Kan’s hair ties tightly wrapped around the base of Steve’s cock to prevent Steve from coming, he quiets down. He understands that this is for the best; he should listen to Kan.

And Kan? As soon as Steve settles down, he starts praising Steve, telling him how good he was for Kan, how sexy and fulfilling he was. It warms Steve’s heart and he becomes so hopeful hearing it. Kan continues to nuzzle and kiss him for a long time, even goes as far as getting Steve water and a snack. An hour later, Kan and Steve are still lying in the afterglow, their skin prickling, and their eyes glowing.


	5. Punishment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Do you know how many times I’ve fought for your names to stay clean? How many of your charges I’ve beat off? Did you know that each one of you has just as much property damage as Deadpool and beyond? Would you like for me to be let out of another federal court in handcuffs? Do you want to see me dead on the court’s stairway one more time? Is that what you want?”

So their first time had taken a lot of discussion. Kan insisted on developing things slowly. Steve’s first time should be dedicated to make him feel good. Apparently anal isn’t as easily pleasurable as you see in porn; you can’t just shove a cock up in your asshole like that and think it’s going to feel good, especially for as hard of a scene as they’ve planned. But Steve is a superhero, okay, he’ll use his traffic lights like a good boy if he doesn’t enjoy it.

Because he does need it a bit more extreme than others, he thinks. He fights supervillains and a day he crashes a plane with all the bad guys in it, is a good day. So what if Kan is going to make him submit and fuck his ass at the first time. Steve can take it, and he knows himself well enough to be aware that he needs a little extra to be pushed over the edge. Kan looks surprised for a second, before he states that he isn’t aware that Steve in reality is a BDSM-veteran and that he has had BDSM sex with his girlfriends for all of these years. The deliberate sarcasm goes through; having sex and fighting a villain are different, despite how their first time proves to Steve, that the rush isn’t all that different.

They settle on making the scene more about being dominated than enjoying it. Afterwards, when Steve doesn’t experience subdrop, they dare be more ambitious and it feels strange, being engulfed in their little world all the time and forgetting there is a world outside. Kan is attentive; Kan is close. And when they have a scene, these traits blow up and everything is about Steve. Steve rarely sees the others this time around, and when he does he is almost always feeling high and floating. People tell him that he looks happier and more glowing ever since he went on vacation, when really, in-between good days where Kan makes sure to take care of him; there are still bad days.

Steve sees it as a sign that they should just scene on bad days, but Kan isn’t too happy about it.

“There are coping methods and there is coping, Steven,” he says a little wistfully. They’re lying in the bedroom. It’s a bad day. Usually Steve isn’t keen on communication in these days, not so much touching either (unless he is crying), but he has arranged his head in Kan’s lap, just to set the mood for his proposal. The sun warms their figures and makes Kan’s shoulder-long hair look like a halo. “I’m not gonna help you get into a nasty spiral.”

“I’m not going to,” Steve promises, trying to sound earnest.

“It’s not really your choice once it happens, Steven,” Kan says.

Steven looks up at him. “I don’t know what you went through, but, I’m not you, Kan. It’s not necessarily going to happen with me.”

Kan smiles down at him. “But my rule still stands.”

Of course, Steven has therefore tried a bit of everything to lure Kan into doing a scene with him on bad days. He needs that white-hot oblivion only Kan can give him. When he figures out how upset it makes Kan, he does stop though.

But on good days; good days means seeing friends and being okay, exercising until he’s tired and …

Kan smacks his ass. “Be still!” he snaps and Steve sniffs. His neck and shoulders are the only parts of his body touching the bed, his spine curved so his legs are stretching down towards his face. Kan is holding Steve’s legs up by the knees, keeping them spread, his own knees a few inches in front of Steve’s face. Kan’s knees are a few inches in front of Steve’s face. It’s a plow pose-ish position Steve has been in regularly, because of his exercises, but he’s not used to being in the position for so long. The way his ass is tilted towards Kan’s crotch, spread open and easily accessible does something to his stomach and cock though.

It doesn’t help that Kan’s three thick fingers are roughly working him loose, making Steve twitch and pant. He has gotten used to the sensation, gotten used to the burn, the implications and he has started enjoying getting fucked – even if the thrusts doesn’t always hit his G-spot.

“But it hurts, Kan,” Steve whines and Kan smacks his ass again in warning.

“I can’t wait for you to become loose enough,” Kan scolds as he basically plunges Steve’s inside with his fingers. “I’ve been going for over five minutes, and you have yet to take my fist, boy.”

“I’m sorry, Kan,” Steve whimpers and Kan hits him again.

“Stop apologizing, I don’t want to hear excuses,” he yells and slips in a fourth finger. Steve’s eyes shut closed and his mouth falls open as he squirms, and lowers his knees down further, so his balls are hanging closely to Steve’s mouth. Automatically Steve opens his mouth and reaches out with his tongue, but Kan gets up again so Steve can’t reach.

“Lick my balls, boy,” Kan commands and smacks Steve’s ass again.

“I can’t – “

Kan’s interrupting spank tells Steve how much it matters to him what Steve can. Steve wails from the rawness of it, and then lifts his head, making his neck ache, trying to reach with his tongue, but Kan’s balls are still too much out of reach and Kan continues to punish him for it, his fingers still impatiently working Steve’s hole open. Steve can feel himself start to sniffle, the pain so good and fulfilling and with no edges at all, and still humiliating enough for him to burn his stomach.

“You shouldn’t have been such a naughty boy, Steven,” Kan growls. “I’m very angry with you. And look at you! Can’t even take the consequences of your actions, can’t even,” Kan’s thumb slides in and Steve screams, “take your punishment with a stoic face! I don’t want to hear _one_ sound coming from your mouth.”

With these words he takes his cock and pushes it directly into Steve’s mouth, resting his weight on Steve’s face, forcing Steve to take all of it.

“Breath through your nose,” Kan coldly instructs and then clenches his fist inside Steve. Steve is crying silently now, trying to accommodate all the sensations without losing it.

“Look at you,” Kan drawls and he sounds so satisfied. “Loose and taking my fist. God, you could take whatever – whoever – in here. Couldn’t you, Steven?”

Steve’s face contracts, as the thought of it makes him flinch, and Kan chooses this moment to punch into Steve. Steve garbles around the thick, hot length in his mouth.

“You could take all of them, if I asked you to,” Kan muses and he’s panting now as he fucks his fist into his partner. Finally he gets up on his knees, extracting his cock, and Steve’s jaw hurts and clicks and Kan is obviously waiting to see if Steve has anything to say, before he lowers himself down again, now gripping the base of Steve’s cock so tight it almost hurts.

“You had one job, you filthy animal,” Kan grumbles and lightly smacks Steve’s ass cheeks when Steve’s tailbone loses strength and his ass wavers. Kan continues punching into him until Steve’s head is filled with nothing but thoughts about the feel of the fist inside of him and that singing burning sensation on his skin. Kan uses his free hand to keep Steve’s ass up by the thigh, as his hips seemingly automatically starts fucking Steve’s mouth.

“Make that noise, boy, make that sweet noise so I know how intense it feels,” Kan coos. “And don’t you dare come, I swear if you come I will make you regret it.”

Steve lets himself groan and every groan is interrupted with Kan’s thick cockhead forcing itself down Steve’s airway and blocking all sound.

“Do you understand?” Kan yells, but Steve can’t answer because his mouth is too full. Kan is starting to twist his hips a bit, like he is trying to –

Steve chokes as Kan’s cock bends just enough for it to slip into Steve’s throat, and Steve blinks away tears, as the sensitive thin skin of Kan’s balls touch Steve’s nose.

Kan reaches down and unbelievably enough gets his fingers into Steve’s mouth. He pulls open Steve’s mouth so wide that his jaw feels on the brink of unhinging, and then gently inserts a small portion of his balls into Steve’s mouth.

“Make me come. And don’t you let one single drop cum dirty a specter of this room,” Kan commands. Steve is trying so hard not to come himself. Only the job of being able to take the thick dick filling his mouth distracts him from the amazing feeling throbbing like one big pulse in the entirety of his crotch.

Kan’s fisting quickens and Steve weeps, trying so hard not to come though his own pre-come leaks down this abs and gathers in a puddle in the hollow of his stretched neck, his cock hot and red.

Instead he tries to concentrate on getting Kan off, but there’s no use trying, Kan has his weight rested so well that Steve can’t even lift his head and meet his thrusts, so he just stays there and tries to swallow and suck as much as possible.

And then Kan decides to push Steve over the edge, because he grips Steve’s cock and starts to jerk him off. Steve screams and his hips jerk, tries to get away from the sudden overwhelming pleasure, but it only makes him lower down on Kan’s fist and Kan lets go of his dick to smack him again, then continuing to mechanically stroke him, and Steve can’t breath probably, his vision is becoming dark and Kan gets his dick out of Steve’s mouth. He starts gasping for breath in relief, and his vision becomes clearer, but he already misses the hotness in his mouth, the thickness, how much it hurt having it so deeply into his throat, his mouth feels cold and empty, his lips are numb and trembling -

Kan grabs his thigh and tilts him forward, directing Steve’s cock directly above Steve’s face. When he continues his hand job, his strokes have maddening twists and the fist in his ass speeds up and Steve begs “Please, please, can I come,” and Kan says “No” but keeps jerking Steve off anyway, fucking him in the same speed. Steve’s mouth is open, startled sobs and moans leaving his mouth as he tries to resist, but there’s no way, he can’t –

Steve is a very stubborn man and he lasts and lasts and it almost hurts holding himself back when it’s like at tidal wave persistently pulling him underwater and it’s all horrible and perfect and this is exactly what he deserves, this morbid, eternal pain.

“Come,” Kan orders and at first Steve’s doesn’t understand. “Come, or I will leave you dry and crying right now.”

Steve stares up at him in awe and then yells as he lets his orgasm take him, and it’s splitting him apart, it’s claws all over his skin, it’s everything coming alive and breaking apart, it – it hurts so bad and it’s so hot, Steve is sweating and he can’t see anything, he can only feel his own load of spunk shoot directly into his face, his eye and cheek and open mouth and Kan consciously wheels Steve’s dick, making a curving stripe on Steve’s neck and collarbone. His own seed is hot and bitter and dirty.

His hips and legs are shaking violently during the aftershocks and both of Kan’s hands have to keep him in place.

“You see that?” Kan asks as Steve’s head spins. “You were so good for me. That’s how you make me happy. Now that wasn’t so hard, was it? You’re making me so very proud today, Steven.”

Steve is staring at him, his chest still feeling torn up and his mind still woozy.

“You want my come as a reward?” Kan asks and Steve nods eagerly, only now noticing the constant stream of tears rolling down, dampening the bed sheets.

Kan clenches his hand inside Steven again and Steve tenses, his mouth falling open in a pained cry and Kan continues thrusting into Steve’s sore hole, as he jerks himself off, he strokes an eight time, a ninth, and then he also spends himself all over Steve’s face.

Kan’s cock is angry and red as he comes, sweat dripping down his thighs and he looks like he is going to swoon as he finally comes, his strong body shaking and crumpling, his eyes drawing shut, expression looking like someone riding ecstasy.

When he is done, he unclenches his fist in Steve’s ass, and carefully pulls out. Steve cringes as it happens and he feels empty again, needy and craving. Kan slowly gets Steve down on his back and Steve lies there breathing heavily like a fish on land.

Kan meticulously gathers the come on Steve’s face. When his palm is cupping a good amount of come, he opens Steve’s mouth, forces it all in and then seals Steve’s mouth shut with a tight hand. Steve gurgles it down, his own sperm and Kan’s, it all tasting the same anyway.

When Steve displays a cum-free tongue to Kan, Kan lubes up his gloved hand and thrusts into Steve again.

Steve feels loose and very sore, but it still feels good, it still feels amazing, just because Steve’s head is in the clouds and getting used is the best sort of caress. Kan praises him in a low voice as he just takes and takes until Steve’s hard again.

“Kan, I can’t,” Steve mewls. “I need to come again.”

“But you’re doing so well right now. Do you really want to screw it and become a bad boy again?” Kan asks and then kisses Steve’s ass cheeks soothingly. “Don’t you want to be a good boy?”

Steve tears up by the words, and shame fills his gut. “Yes.”

Kan nods. He continues gently taking Steve’s ass with his fist, and when Steve feels like someone has been cracking the whip on him for hours, Kan finally lets him go. As Steve fights to sit up straight, swaying and definitely dizzy, Kan discards his glove and disinfects his hands, waving them until they’re dry, while Steve waits, his ass resting on his heels, his spine aching and his hole trying to tighten.

Kan slaps Steve across the face. “Get on your hands and knees.”

But Steve can’t really. Honestly he can’t even feel his limbs anymore, but Kan smacks him over the face, harder this time, and Steve clumsily gets on his hands and knees, crawls backwards so his ass is close to Kan’s crotch, and lays his face on his lower arms, waiting.

“Fuck yourself on me,” Kan directs.

Steve reaches out until he finds the stiff length, and positions Kan’s dick against his hole and then starts fucking himself on the cock.

“Not like that!” Kan yells and without warning grabs the back of Steve’s hair and bangs Steve’s face down into the mattress, and then starts slamming into Steve, makes him choke on nothing and cry into the bed sheet, which is steadily rubbing his cheeks and nipples raw and it doesn’t matter, he is so ready to come he feels like he might explode.

“Come,” Kan says again. “Come, Steve.”

Steve exhales shakily, trying to focus on letting his orgasm come, but it feels out of reach, like he has been suppressing it for too long.

“Come,” Kan says, lifts Steve’s head back and in tact with his thrust he knocks Steve’s face into the mattress, chanting: “Come, come, come, come, come – “ until it’s finally too much and Steve screams into the mattress. His cock spurts dryly and he’s not even keeping his own weight up anymore, Kan entirely supporting him now. Kan plunges his cock in deep and he comes hotly for a second time, inside Steve.

He slips out and lets Steve fall onto his side. He then lays down beside Steve, and closes his arms around him.

“It’s okay, you did so good, Stevie,” Kan whispers and peppers Steve’s face with kisses despite the congealing layers of semen on it and gently pulls in strands of hair. “You were so beautiful, you took your punishment so beautifully.”

“You were so rough with me,” Steve sobs. “It hurt so much, Kan.”

“I know, I know,” Kan coos soothingly. “You were a good boy, you were so brave.”

\----

**Now**

Kan rarely talks about himself. Sometimes he mentions a mission or tells a funny story Steve has yet not experienced; they even use hours pouring over unclassified mission reports, comparing them, and Kan filling him in about stuff that might happen. The year is 2031 and not 2006 on Kan's side, so chronologically Steve is 102 years old and Kan is 125, but including the years Steve spent in Dimension Z, they've both been awake for about 25 years.

As time passes, more and more Avengers seek Steven out. It’s been over two months now, and there’s only so long Steve can keep up his job with mission reports and teleconferences.

And then of course, Tony, Reed and Pym stumble in one morning and hand him a file.

“Okay, I just want to say we’ve got everything under control,” Tony starts out, and then fills him in on a sentient virus, developing a group of super-A.I.s called the First Six, until Pym gets agitated of it all being explained in the wrong way and takes over, until Reed feels obligated to notify Pym about the first mistakes the biochemist had made, such as letting the virus evolve.

“So, it sorta became evil,” Tony interrupts when Pym and Reed get into a discussion about how the virus should’ve been developed.

Steve frowns. “Again?”

Tony looks surprised for a minute and then awkwardly laughs. “But only 2 of them developed a destructive nature,” he hurries to add.

He proceeds to explain that first of the First Six is called the Destroyer and his name faithful, can destroy the world, but is in hibernation. The second one called Dimitrios has tried to take over the world, but the third and fourth members stopped him – one of them even disabled a terror attack recently because she’s developed psychic powers. Before it all begun a sibling killed the fifth one, and the sixth has disappeared without a trace.

“Okay, two of them are good,” Steve says and rubs his eyes. “That’s something.”

Someone knocks on the door. It’s Sam. Steve knows he’s busy these days, he knows Tony is all over the place too, but thankfully the Iron Nail has been defeated, so missions are probably going be a bit lighter for now. God, he should’ve never taken this vacation, he should’ve been on the job. He’s going to talk with Sam about it, it should’ve been him taking the Iron Nail case instead of Falcon, the Avengers are already stretched thin as it is.

“Kan called,” Sam says, eyeing Steve with knowing eyes and looking at the three scientists. “What’s up?”

Steve rubs his forehead. Kan isn’t allowed in the room, but dear god Steve hopes that he still has some of that mead left somewhere.

“I assure you we will take care of the two hostiles, Captain Rogers,“ Reed begins. “But –“

“We fucked up the south border,” Tony interrupts again. He has the look in his face, awaiting and weary, knowing that Steve is getting close to losing his patience. “Bordering to Mexico. We need – I’ve already talked to S.H.I.E.L.D. but they’d rather have you dealing with the situation.”  
  
Because they know the president of Mexico owes Steve a favor. So they expect Steve to sweep this under the rug.

“Excuse me, but how many times is this going to happen?” Steve snaps. They look at him. “I mean, how many times do I have to fix your screw-ups? Seriously? Are you doing this on purpose? Do you secretly hate me?”

Tony is holding up his hands like surrender. “Woah, Steve, where is this coming from?”

Steve stares at him for a minute. “What do you think I’m going off about?” he then asks and shakes his head while rubbing his temple. "Do you know how many times I’ve fought for your names to stay clean? How many of your charges I’ve beat off? Did you know that each one of you has just as much property damage as Deadpool and more? Would you like for me to be let out of another federal court in handcuffs? Do you want to see me dead on the court’s stairway one more time? Is that what you want?”

“Steve, that’s not at all what we do,” Hank states, sounding distressed.

“Starting to seem like it,” Steve continues. “I’m gonna tell you now and not one more time: Please stop building smart things. And I’m not saying this lightly; I’ve seen some magnificent, smart, brilliant A.I.’s in my time, but for the love of God, never from your hands. And I’m not going to stand here and say I’m so much better. Lord knows my screw-ups still keep me up at night.”

He shakes his head, staring at them and then staring at the wall, feeling dread and panic fill his chest. He can’t stand to look at them right now. “You know the judge who usually trials your case, Judith Blacksmith? We have coffee twice a month. We’ve gotten to know each other personally. Maybe that’s why she turns a blind eye. They all turn a blind eye because I’m Captain America, and all of you know that when you send me. And it’s wrong, okay? It’s wrong because I don’t believe in you like I once did. Bill’s blood is just a little too vivid on my hands. I can’t see anything else, when I think about it.” Steve’s voice breaks, and Pym, Tony and Reed all look like someone has slapped them.

“What?” Steve shouts. “You think those half-assed flowers you send once a month make things right? You think Thomas or the rest of Bill’s family are content with that? That’s right, I know about Thomas, had to see his face in the Raft, because none of you clots of ear wax dared tell me about the lasting consequences of _your_ invention, that _thing_ , I don’t even want to name. Meanwhile Simon decides to attack us for the umpteenth time, and somehow he is still not getting the help he deserves.”

"He helped us find Janet," Pym snaps, which reminds Steve that maybe he shouldn't agitate the man, considering his history with anger. 

"I don't care if he was giving Bernie Sanders a blowjob in front of Donald Trump, he is hurting himself and he is hurting others. And you know what the worst thing is? _The worst thing_?” 

Silence meets him.

 “You people just go ahead and do it all over again. Every single thing, which went wrong the last time, repeats itself. Even me, the brawny soldier with my brains in my shield knows you're more likely to keep inventing these... abominations, before you fix global warming. Is it a scientist thing?” Steve groans. “Can’t you just… stick to simple things for a while? Like a Copwatch a cop can't turn off, so I don’t have to call the NYPD and throw my weight around every time Sam gets pulled over for nothing?”

 “You did _not_ just say that,” Sam exclaims.

“You bet your ass I did,” Steve retorts without looking away from his old friends. “But it’s starting to become one of the few things I don’t mind using my authority to do.”

“Steve, is this maybe the Zola virus speaking?” Pym asks which he knows he can’t do in front of the others, he _knows_ it’s a secret.

“What virus?” Tony asks staring back and forth at Steve glaring at Pym.

“It’s not the damn virus,” Sam backs Steve up. This guy is a true friend. Steve ought to buy something for him. Like a bird park. “Steve’s been talking about this for some time. Not easy saying no to your old buddies who helped you get on your feet back in the day.”

Steve puts the file on the table. “You fix this yourself.”

“ _What virus_?” Tony asks again, this time more alarmed.

“Pym,” Steve says in a warning tone.

“I understand, Captain Rogers,” Reed says. “It wasn’t to tear at our friendship we sought you out for help. I assure you, we can take care of this ourselves.”

“It’s alright,” Steve allows himself to sigh. He feels deflated and tired and guilty.

“Are we done here,” Sam asks, sounding just as exhausted.

Reed leaves, but Pym stands still with his arms crossed and Tony is doing that face he does when he’s two seconds away from shooting repulsor blasts at the ceiling.

Steve nods once and goes to grab his jacket.

“Where are you going?” Tony asks, following him as Steve gets it on.

“Kan!” Steve shouts.

Kan immediately opens the door. The bastard was probably listening.

“We’re leaving this house,” Steve says. Kan nods and without question grabs his own brown leather jacket. Steve picks up his wallet.

“Where are you going?” Tony asks, now sounding a bit panicked. “Let’s talk about this, Steve, come on – “

“No,” Steve says. “I’m sick of this house and I’m sick of this conversation, I’m leaving and don’t you dare follow.”

“Is it because of him?” Tony asks Steve, looking accusingly at Kan, but Steve just shoves Sam and Kan out and closes the door after him, leaving his room in Avengers Tower empty.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Primer:  
> The incident Steve is upset about, with the Mexican boarder, is merely fiction. I felt justified writing the accusations, since the claims are pretty valid and Steve is upset and oversensitive right now.  
> If you want to know more about the First Six, you can read about them in Avengers AI.  
> The court shooting scene Steve refers to, is from Civil War.  
> Bill Foster is an Avenger, who was killed by Ragnerok, a clone of Thor made by Reed, skrull Hank and Tony during Civil War. Thomas Foster eventually sorta became evil to avenge his uncle's murder.


	6. Bubble Burst

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s biting his lip, and Steve feels insecure for a second, fearing that Kan is doing this out of a false sense of obligation.
> 
> But Kan has that flush in his cheeks, that playful smirk is beginning to spread on his lips, and Steve gets it. He gets it.
> 
> Kan understands the trap of the euphoria of sex, because he has been caught up on it too.
> 
> They’re encouraging each other's bad habits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i don't think this chap needs much introduction. enjoy! ^^'

There are many bad days after that. Steve tries not to think too much of it; this was bound to start boiling out eventually.

Still, they’re his friends and he feels like he has pushed them away and in the end it all feels like a joke. After having waited for them for 12 years, how he had hoped and hoped that they’d come save him, and now he doesn’t even want to look at them anymore.  

Shortly after Steve and Kan dust off Steve’s Brooklyn apartment, the nightmares begin. It’s actually odd that they haven’t made an appearance before now, that Steve’s sleep has been a place he could actually relax.

Their images are not surprising. It’s Sharon’s burning corpse in the explosion. It’s Ian screaming in agony and covered in blood and pierced with bullet holes. It’s Zola’s face in his chest.

Every night he wakes with a jolt, and wakes up Kan too. Kan always tries to comfort him, but there’s only so long Steve can share a bed with a good conscience, before he starts to sleep on the couch. Kan tries to follow him, but when he finds out it only makes Steve feels worse, he stops.

One morning at 5 a.m., when Kan is still sleeping in the bedroom, Steve still hasn’t fallen asleep. His eyes feel dry and swollen and he feels worn out. Worn out and undermined and thirsting and he feels like he just can’t do it anymore. He feels thin and he just wants to die. But he can’t go without settling matters first; he can’t go making the Avengers believe it was their fault.

So he calls up Tony. The man picks up after the second ring.

“Steve?” he says immediately.

Steve wets his chapped lips. “Hey,” he says and when his voice comes out really raspy, he adds: “I’m sorry, were you sleeping?” in a clearer voice.

Tony breathes out heavily in the phone. “I’ve always got time for you, Steve.”

Steve feels his eyes water and his mouth becomes a thin line. “I know,” he says and miraculously manages to make his voice sound clear. It’s all about the small accomplishments. “I’m sorry, Tony. It’s. It’s been difficult lately. And I lashed out and said a lot of things that were hurtful. I swear, it wasn’t my intention to highlight a rift between us.”

Tony sighs. “No, Steve, it’s alright. You weren’t all wrong in the things you said, and I’m … I’m sorry too. None of us wanted to hurt you.”

“No, it’s not alright,” Steve argues. “The thing with Bill Foster – Ultron, Dimitrios, J.A.R.V.I.S., all of them – I know it kills all of you. And it was unfair of me to dig it up and call you the things I did.”

There’s a pro-longed silence. “I guess even we can manage to make Captain America lose his shit, and make him call us ‘clots of earwax’.”

Steve smiles humorlessly. He wonders if Tony too is thinking about the day Steve found out about the Illuminati and that they had had the Infinity Gems in their keeping all along, when Tony had claimed to the Avengers that he had willed the gauntlet out of existence. It had angered Steve, both because he didn’t quite trust all of the members of the Illuminati to keep their hands off the gems and because of the current situation at that time: how dangerous it was that two of the Infinity Gems had already been stolen from the Illuminati’s safekeeping. They had lied about it, gone behind everyone’s backs because they thought they were smarter and therefore better at keeping the gems safe, and in the end they hadn’t managed it. God, Steve had been so angry.

Maybe it’s that incident, on top of the scar of Civil War, that has kept Steve hesitant about trusting Tony these days. Trusting any of them.

Steve sighs.

“What?” Tony inquires in a relaxed tone.

“Nothing,” Steve says and then laughs dryly. “Sorry. I’m having all kinds of suspicious thoughts about people lately. But I’m glad I could call you, Tony. Overall I don’t think your group hurt people with your inventions.“

“What do you mean by my group?”

Steve hesitates, wanting to avoid sounding patronizing. “I … I don’t know. The portion of the Avengers whom are really smart?” He hesitates. “You know, a group like the Illuminati.”

Steve loves these folks like they were his brothers – and in a way, they are – but it’s not a surprise that they happened. These people in particular had the exact amount of arrogance, intelligence, wealth and privilege to feel justified in going behind everyone’s backs. And Steve can admit, most of the time they do their jobs excellently. But it still doesn’t sit right with Steve. It probably never will.

It’s all done now. Why does Steve need to tear open old wounds so much?

“I’m sorry for bringing it up,” Steve apologizes. “I’ll let you sleep.”

“Hey, you can always call me,” Tony mummers, sounding slightly anxious. “And stop apologizing so much.”

“Alright. Sleep well.”

“Hey, wait, Steve,” Tony starts as Steve’s about to hang up. “The part you said where… you said you didn’t believe in us. Was that true?”

Steve closes his eyes. He doesn’t want to make this worse, but he can’t bring himself to lie either. “Yes. But. It’s unjustified. Sometimes it feels like your inventions, your – your actions bring more harm than good, but I know that’s not true. We need you. I need you, Shellhead.”

He forces himself to radiate reassurance, a faith that’s not quite fully there.

“Alright, Steve,” Tony says, sounding just a little put out. “Thank you for answering honestly. Do you want to tell me about that virus…?”

“Oh, it was just a bug,” Steve says and clears his throat. So Pym hadn’t told on him. “You know Zola’s inventions. I’m clean now, don’t worry, but it’s probably why my mood has been all over the place lately.”

“Sure,” Tony affirms but Steve senses that Tony knows it isn’t the whole story. “I’m going to bed now.”

He hangs up. Steve stares at the phone for a second, before he calls up Pym.

\-----

“Come,” Kan calls, standing imposing in the hallway, glaring at Steve. “Let’s go for a drive. Come on, Tony let us borrow his car.”

“How did you get his permission?”

Kan shrugs. “I impersonated you a little bit on the phone. It’s the Ferrari without the roof on and it’s warm outside, it’s gonna be nice.”

Steve resists at first but when Kan low-key threatens bringing Sam along instead, he gets up. He doesn’t want Sam to realize that Steve has a hard time getting up from bed. They get in the car and the sun is high and hot, the wind is strong and comfortably tepid. Kan wants to leave the city for an afternoon, so they go underground and it takes too long down there before they get to the bridge, which eventually takes them to New Jersey. They drive on the highway, and it should feel refreshing, but Steve is all sloppy and loose on the car seat, his face barely facing forward and his mouth a tired pout. His hair is waving rapidly with the rush of the wind, and his hands are folded lifelessly on his lap.

“What are you thinking about?” Kan asks once they’ve reached calmer waters and he can slow down a bit, so the wind won’t deafen them.

“Nothing,” Steve answers. “It’s a beautiful day.”

“It is,” Kan agrees.

“Pull over and fuck me over the hood of the car.”

Kan sighs and pulls over. “Not over the hood, you’ll burn yourself.”

“That’s the idea,” Steve lets him know.

“No, Steven,” Kan says. “If it’s going to happen, we’re doing it on the backseats.”

“Fine.”

They drive down a bumpy road for a while, until they get behind some bushes and trees, hearing the ocean close by somewhere. When they’re in a secluded enough place, Kan turns off the car and Steve slides back to the backseat. He shimmies his pants and undies down to his knees and Kan clinically unbuckles his jeans and shoves his boxers and jeans down.

The prep is fast, but goes smoothly, with Steve looking at the sky as Kan works more on getting him open than making him enjoy it. Steve’s head is resting on the armrest, one of his arms hanging down and the other holding the head rest. Kan is bent over him, hair glistening like fine silk in the sun. He’s biting his lip, and Steve feels insecure for a second, fearing that Kan is doing this out of a false sense of obligation.

But Kan has that flush in his cheeks, that playful smirk is beginning to spread on his lips, and Steve gets it. He gets it.

Kan understands the trap of the euphoria of sex, because he has been caught up on it too.

They’re encouraging each other's bad habits.

Kan slaps him over the cheek. “Keep focus,” he instructs. Steve blinks hazily up at him, the sun hot on his face. His lip feels sore and puffed and he realizes he has been chewing on it all along. He doesn’t get to evaluate how long Kan’s hair has gotten before Kan, with an abrupt and definitely very arousing strength, pulls Steve’s legs around his hips, making Steve’s head fall down on the car seats.

He searches Steve’s jeans and finds some packets of lube (it earns Steve a twinge on his left nipple), lubes up his dick and wipes the slick left on his hand onto the car seat. Steve kicks him on his skin for that.

“We’re borrowing,” Steve begrudgingly reminds him.

But Kan just looks really pleased, and Steve has this odd feeling that he’s marking his territory to Tony, and before he can decide whether it’s on Steve or on the car, Kan penetrates him without warning. He cries out, and immediately Kan covers his mouth as Kan's cock grinds in deeper and Steve moans into the hand, his hands fisting.

As Kan finds a steady rhythm, Steve looks down the girth of his chest, looks at Kan as he thrusts, the V of his abdomen forming a nice shape from above Steve’s asshole. Kan returns his stare and with a growl he hammers in, stays there and then claws off Steve’s T-Shirt.

“I always want to see your fucking tits, Steven,” he growls and cups Steve’s pectorals in his hands. With a squeeze that makes Steve roll his eyes to the back of his head, Kan adds: “How many times have I told you already?”

He slaps down on Steve’s sensitive nipple and Steve cries out.

“I don’t want my cock in your filthy ass if you’re not showing me the tits,” Kan continues, the growling turning into a sweet hum as he bows down towards Steve’s chest. Steve closes his eyes, prepares himself for the worst, and then, predictably enough, he can feel Kan’s front teeth close around Steve’s nipple and bite down with a razor-like sharpness.

Steve groans and then outright cries out, as Kan continues to worry it until it seriously feels like it’s getting cut open and then Kan moves onto the other nipple. He continues his harsh treatment as his cock keeps rocking into Steve, gradually forcing him further towards the wall of the car door. Steve opens his watering eyes and sees his nipple, red and swollen between Kan’s lips.

Kan licks them afterwards and Steve can’t stop making noise, can’t stop the moans and whines spilling from his lips as Kan licks the broken skin, sucks on it, increasing the pressure and making the soreness feel worse, until he finally pulls back and pinches Steve’s nipples with his fingers.

Steve’s cries out, his toes curling, as his head throws back, his hands searching for something to hold, because Steve’s body still hasn’t gotten the memo that he isn’t on the battlefield. His nipples look perky and red, obscene and sinful, like flower buds.

As sweat starts to drip down Kan's chest, down his hairless torso with his brown nipples and into the trail of hair on his abdomen, his hands close around Steve’s neck. Steve has time for a sharp inhale before his airways are forced shut. Because Steve can hold his breath for such a long time, Kan feels comfortable making the hold tight and long, and minutes pass before the strangulation becomes everything, makes his face and neck throb, his lips numb, and his dick and hole twice as sensitive, his stomach and skin tingling. Steve gets pushed over the edge, the orgasm feeling explosive and his body keeps arching and tensing, his ass shaking as Kan fucks him through the aftershocks.

“You know what I’m going to do with you?” Kan growls, grabbing Steve’s hair and shaking his head. “I’m going to take you to one of those BDSM clubs, and I’m going to take all the men I can find and make them fuck you. All of them, at least ten, on top of a sofa table, just stuff your hole and mouth with cock, let you take more than one at a time and let them waste themselves until your asshole leaks so much that their sperm drips off the fucking table.”

Steve blinks in a daze and looks down at his ass being worked over, on the intense look Kan gives him as he strangles Steve, and Steve finds a place to put his hands. He grabs the back of his knees and bends them further back so Kan fuck him even deeper and it’s not more than a few thrusts before Kan closes his mouth and moans. Kan has a beautiful face when he cums. From the little porn Steve has seen males generally don’t have a good orgasm face; it always looks like they’re ready to sneeze. Steve has no illusions about his own, but Kan? Kan’s pink, slick mouth slides open in an o, his brows frown like he’s singing a high tone, his hands are loose and twitching, and his shoulders and cheeks are flushed. It’s truly beautiful.

\-----

The same evening both Tony and Sam drop by. Usually Sam isn’t keen on spending free time with many of the other Avengers, and sometimes Steve gets the feeling that Tony doesn’t really like sharing their time much either, but the two men have clearly made some sort of deal to focus on having a good time. Kan makes coffee and tea and covers the table with snacks as Steve talks to the two men about work. At some point Kan cleans the table and replaces the warm drinks with cold beer and soda for Tony. As always Kan doesn’t draw attention towards himself and when he’s done serving, he quietly exits the living room and goes to the guest room.

Immediately Sam nods towards the guy’s direction and asks: “What’s up with him?”

Steve shrugs. “He’s not keen on talking to many.”

“You think he’s a threat?” Tony asks a bit lower.

Steve immediately shakes his head. “No. I’m pretty sure he’s just keeping his head down until he gets to go home.”

“You know why he’s here in the first place?” Tony goes on. He looks a little sleep-deprived. Hadn’t he gone back to bed after their phone call? He should start to watch out for that. He doesn’t have Extremis anymore and compared to Steve, he actually ages. There are lines around his eyes and mouth enhanced with stress and overworking.

“Not more than you,” Steve admits and shrugs.

“And are you sure this is safe?” Sam asks.

Steve doesn’t feel entitled to spill details about Kan, but he also needs to reassure them. “Kan, is uh – he seems like a really mysterious guy, but he’s actually just retired and boring.”

“Seriously, relax,” he adds when they don’t look convinced. “All we do is eat pancakes – or whatever that stuff’s called – and shout at each other about nipples.”

Sam chokes in his beer. Tony stares at him.

Steve shakes his head, taking a sip of his beer. “It’s dumb.”

And that’s how Natasha happens.

Now, Steve has a huge amount of respect and love for Natasha, but he isn’t dumb. When she shows up next morning for his and Kan’s morning run in similar training gear, Steve doesn’t doubt for a second that either Sam has ratted Steve’s situation out to Bucky or Tony hired her to spy on them.

Either way, Steve welcomes her since there’s not much else he can do that wouldn’t make bells ring in her head. Kan and Steve sandwich her and run at her preferred pace, and when they get home, Natasha invites herself up. Kan takes the first shower, then Steve, and they both pretend that Natasha doesn’t sneak around the apartment in the meantime, probably doing her thing, but hiding it well.

They make breakfast and watch TV. At noon they eat again and go to the park. Kan looks like a cat whose home has been invaded and scowls at Natasha as she puts her feet on the coffee table and flips through the channels.

When it becomes evening they all sit down and play poker. Natasha has given up poking at Kan and starts poking Steve. Kan does the laundry and makes dinner, hiding in the kitchen. Traitor.

At midnight, Kan slams open the kitchen door, just to see her mattress being rolled out on the floor in the living room. “What do you want?” he snaps at Natasha.

“Nothing,” Natasha says.

“Come on you two,” Steve sighs. “No fighting.”

They both shut up, but later during the Friday movie they continuously snarl at each other. Steve doesn’t let it bother him, but it seems that Kan has to actively avoid arguments with the lady and Natasha keeps searching for and pushing his buttons.

He doesn’t want to ask Natasha to leave though. Asking her to leave would just make this whole case even more serious, so after Kan has said goodnight, Steve goes to bed as well.

At 3 a.m., sleep still hasn’t found Steve and maybe it has something to do with how worn-out his body always is at the end of good days.

He wraps himself in his duvet and walks out of his room. He sneaks through the hallway and whispers in front of the door to the guest room. A second later, Kan opens the door and lets him in.

Steve knows it’s a bad idea, but he needs it so bad and as they lay down, Steve immediately rolls on top of Kan. Kan welcomes him with strong arms and lets Steve straddle him as they try to make out without feeling too conscious about their guest. Steve gets hard and starts to frantically rub his pajamas-covered groin against Kan. Kan sighs, clenching Steve’s ass in his hands and Steve exhales shakily, blinking open his eyes as Kan’s fingers creep down underneath Steve’s waistband. He sighs and leans his cheek against Kan’s neck, and –

Natasha is standing by the door and her lips are pinched.

He groans. “Natasha is standing by the door,” he informs Kan.

Kan freezes and then rolls his face towards the door.

“Just ignore her,” Kan whispers. “Watching gets her off.”

But Steve can’t really ignore one of his oldest friends staring at him … masturbating? Touching himself? Having sex?

He rolls off Kan and sits on the bedside. “What do you want, Natasha?”

“What is this?” Natasha asks, sounding only slightly hostile.

“What does it look like?” Steve asks. “I’m masturbating.”

“With your other self?” Natasha abruptly snaps, looking alarmed, as if she’s getting ready for a physical fight.

“I don’t want to discuss it any further,” Steve says with a sigh. “Go give your report and leave us alone.”

She slams the door closed.

For an hour they lie in silence, staring at the reflection of the streets lights on the windows.

Then Steve says: “I don’t want her here anymore.”

And Kan answers: “I’ll fix it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope a certain someone *coughV-birdcough* liked the insistently requested car sex ^^


	7. Natasha's little girl

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “People won’t notice you taking things away if you give them something they greed for in return, Steven,” Kan explains as he clips Steve’s nails.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to MrCourtesy for the inspiration!

At worst she reports them to have officially gone crazy, at best they get a few laughs and some dirty jokes.

Steve apathetically thinks he should care more about the outcome of this event; care that Natasha knows his secret, knows about Kan, but all of it seems distant to him. It’s not his problem; he hasn’t seen them for a long time anyway. Who are they to tell him their opinions matter? They’re just people he knew once upon a time.

He knows this sort of thinking is not good.

“How is this supposed to work?” Steve asks as he gives Kan a few hundred bills. Kan kneels down to put on Steve’s shoes. Kan’s shoes? Their shoes.

“If she’s anything like my Natasha, she’s going to come on to you,” Kan nonchalantly informs him as he pulls the leather of the shoe over the sole of his foot. He genuinely sounds flirting and sexual tension wouldn’t spoil a decade-old platonic friendship.

“And what am I supposed to do?” Steve asks as Kan straightens up and unhooks his jacket, despite it being a hot day outside.

“Be hot and pretty until she’s coming on to you, I guess,” Kan answers, meeting his eyes. “And remember to say no if it becomes too much.”

“How is this going to help?” Steve asks, deeply confused.

“She’s not gonna dare report you, if she has displayed unprofessional behavior.”

“She’s a spy. That’s routine.”

“Not when it comes to actual friends,” Kan tells him.

“This all sounds very unlikely to happen,” Steve lets him know. “It’s too much of a guess.”

Kan lifts his hands and wriggles his fingers. His nails have red nail polish on them. “You didn’t see her face when I put nail polish on in front of her.”

He kisses Steve’s cheek, before he goes down the stairway to meet Sam downstairs.

Kan disappears for an hour and comes back with five bags from five different fashion chains. From one, he pulls out a dress. It’s chiffon, light and flowing around his thighs. It’s built for men like him, so it’s big enough around his shoulders and tight enough around his hips. The sight of him in the mirror, however, makes him feel perplexed. To see himself in a flowing skirt makes him feel like Captain America playing at being a little girl.

Kan listens to him say this, and only smiles. “Let’s make you a woman then.”

He fills the tub with water and a bath ball and uses forever carefully waxing Steve’s armpits, arms, legs and even his chest. When they’re done, Kan makes Steve moisturize himself in lavender body butter. He … gives Steve some very tight, special underwear and a light, elegant golden body chain, which can’t be seen underneath the dress anyway. Then Kan quickly pulls out a small makeup kit with the brand _Revlon._ He threads the beginning of a beard on Steve’s face, and then slowly starts putting makeup on Steve’s face. He curls Steve’s eyelashes, coats them in black, beats the skin with makeup until it looks smooth and soft and glowing, and draws Steve’s lips up in dark crimson. Steve should find it weird that Kan knows the skills for this, but there are so many things Kan knows and honestly it’s actually kinda fun figuring out the colors, finishes and combinations. He paints Steve’s nails, and does something to his hair, which makes it look more voluminous.

Then Kan arranges him in the living room, flicking on the TV to a music channel. He gives Steve a long speech about safety and saying no and then tells Steve he will be in the next room and Steve only has to call out his name.

Natasha checks in around 2000, throws off her shoes, and then freezes when she sees Steve lying on his stomach on the couch. Steve got tired waiting for her, and has sprawled out with a pillow underneath his stomach, making his ass perk up.

Blushing, he pushes the seam of the dress, which has crawled all the way up to the meeting of his leg and hip, down over his thighs again.

“H-Hey,” Steve greets, feeling very ridiculous and insecure like this. How the Hell is Natasha supposed to come on to him? Steve doesn’t have that rolling-with-it-seduction, which Kan possesses.

“You have no shame, do you?” Natasha asks, sounding almost coldly angry. It comes close to contempt. “Crossdressing?”

Steve shrugs. “This isn’t the first time.”

Natasha’s brows jump up to her hairline.

“Bucky didn’t tell you?” Steve asks. “Anyway, don’t mind it. Do you want to watch TV with me? Kan has gone to bed.”

She stiffly sits down on the other side of the couch and Steve turns up the volume of the music channel. Her senses are just as heightened as his, but he does it by habit. He sits up, and puts his chin on his knees and hugs his legs.

“Can I feel your leg?” she asks.

Steve gapes and stares at her. That was… very quick and very upfront. “Uhm. Sure?”

He folds out his leg and her long-nailed fingers tickle as she slips the palm of her hand down his knee to his shins.

“You waxed them?” she asks.

That was technically not incorrect. “Yes.”

“They’re so smooth,” she mummers and looks down at her own legs. “They’ll grow back within a day though with our rate.”

Steve shrugs, and smiles crookedly at her. He feels down the legs himself, finally allowing himself to, and they’re so soft. “I’m enjoying it as long as it lasts.”

Her fingers pinch around his kneecap, and he quickly looks up to meet her eyes, and then looks down again.

Kan is right. Steve has never seen Natasha so unable to focus, her eyes furtively and repetitively glancing down Steve’s bare shin and his muscular, rounded thighs, her pupils swollen and her intent barely concealed.

Kan had slapped Steve’s thighs, bitten them and told him to use them to his advantage, so Steve slips onto his side again and puts a hand on the peak of his hip, laying himself out since Natasha seems comfortable sitting.

She shoots glares at him and he ignores it in advantage of staring at someone called Ella Eyre.

_We don’t have to take our clothes off to have a good time._

Steve startles when he feels a small hand close around his ankle. He looks at Natasha and raises his brows, but doesn’t comment further on it, even when she continues to scratch his skin with her fingernails and measure the radius of his ankle by cupping her hands around it.

When he finally gets used to the touches, Natasha asks, oddly softly: “Why are you dressed up, Steve?”

“I felt like it,” Steve answers, which is, also, technically not incorrect.

Natasha face gets more and more pinched. “Then what’s going on here? I can’t read you.”

Steve finally sighs and pulls his ankles away from her. “Why are you playing, Natasha? You’re the one making this confusing. What is it you want?”

He knows Kan said that if Natasha does something Steve doesn’t like, he should say no.

But when Natasha straddles Steve’s knees and stroke her flat palms up his thighs he doesn’t say no. When the warm inside of her thighs clutch around his bare skin, he doesn’t say no. When she shivers and looks just about ready to eat him, he doesn’t say no. Instead his lashes lower. She’s wearing sweat pants and a loose white crumpled t-shirt; loose and homey. She looks down at him and then suddenly smirks.

He feels himself blush, as her hand guides itself down underneath his skirt. She pauses for a moment, not showing her reaction, when her fingers catch the rim of Steve’s black thong. She feels her way as she takes in the laces and the small red bows right at his hipbones.

She drags the skirt up and eyes the black thong with the red bows, which, looking down at them now, really do look like the black widow symbol.

“You’re so cute in these,” Natasha almost expressionlessly praises, not being awkward at all with his barely covered crotch.

He twitches and then looks at the ceiling, because he usually doesn’t get the praise unless he has earned it, and it feels wrong for her to do it. She catches the movement right away.

“You’re my girl,” she decides. “You’re wearing them because you know you’re my girl. For now you belong to me.”

She pushes up the dress higher until she sees the spider web-like bralette he’s wearing. It doesn’t have any padding, but the pattern is arranged in a way that compliments the shape of his pectorals. The straps are black but the cups are a dark, dark red, reminding Steve of congealing blood. The bralette has another bow right on his breastbone.

She has yet to touch any intimate parts, and for a while she just looks curiously at him, takes in the sight of the golden body chain curving like an X around his torso.

She bows down and dips her tongue into his naval. He doesn’t move, but just closes his eyes and shivers with a sigh as she tickles the sensitive nerves there with her mouth. She crawls her way up, her tongue following the sharp line in the middle of his chest, until she reaches the spot where he should’ve had chest hair.

“You’re so baby smooth,” she comments, and lightly scratches at a nipple through the bralette. He groans lowly. “I could even make myself believe you’re soft on top of that.”

With these words her hand clenches around his already half-hard crutch. He’s breathing heavier now and she sits up on her knees, and presses their mouths together. She does it heavily and without working up to it, she sticks in her soft tongue in and meets Steve’s. He can’t help but open his mouth wider and she holds his face as she focuses on tasting any specter of Steve’s mouth. Like Kan, she forces him to be passive rather than follow her pace and when he feels heated and definitely hard, she pulls back. Her lips are blood red, like had she been sucking his blood, and she reaches forwards, deliberately smudging the lipstick still on his lips all over his upper lip, cheek and chin.

“Little girl,” she rumbles and Steve throws his head side to side as she traces red staining fingers down his solar plexus. “Little, stupid girl.”

She hooks her hands around his ankles and makes him bend his knees on top of his chest and spread them until he’s almost entirely folded. They’re equally flexible, Natasha probably putting it to better use when it comes to fighting, and Steve can admit, that until recently with Kan, it was Steve’s muscles rather than his flexibility, which was put to good use in the bedroom.

“Is the stupid little girl going to get fucked?” Steve huskily asks.

“Yes,” Natasha whispers, her pupils growing even bigger. “I’m gonna put that little girl into her place.”

With these words she instructs his legs so far back that they touch his shoulders and then tilts his body in a way he’s only familiar with, with Kan.

As he expects, it’s not long before she starts to rub the cloth of the thong right along his rim. At the same time she starts peppering kisses all over his collarbones and sometimes Steve forgets how to not break from the gentlest touches.

She knows all his sensitive spots. Their bodies are similar in their chemistry and she knows how to use his sensitiveness to her advantage. Her lashes tickle his skin as she licks at all his soft spots: right underneath his pectorals, in the line of his breastbone, the curve of his neck, the inside of his elbows. She sucks in his nipples, her lips a gorgeous red flower around them, flicks them with her tongue, all while her index- and middle finger rub his rim in circles. Whenever she leaves his erogenous zones she pauses her fingers, just lets them remain a still constant pressure, as she teases his senses, makes him so hyperaware of her touches that his heart starts beating quicker and louder. He doesn’t know how deep of a daze she has put him in, before he suddenly blinks frantically at the ceiling. He looks down at her.

“Wait,” he says. “Wait, wait, Natasha.”

She lifts her head, looking slightly bothered. Her green eyes meet his and they’re sharp and everything he’d normally welcome right here, right this moment, where his body is floating, is taken over by something soft and forgiving.

“Bucky,” he says and starts pulling himself loose. “Bucky, are you two still –“

Natasha’s eyes widens a bit. “You’ve let it go this far thinking we’re still together?”

Steve starts to push away from her, make more room between them so he can think just a little bit clearer, but her hands tighten on him.

“It’s fine,” she shushes and grabs a fist full of his hair, pulling it almost soothingly. “Relax, we don’t have to talk about it. Barnes and I are not like that. Not anymore.”

She pushes him down on his stomach with force, but he knows he could fight her. If only he wanted to.

“Don’t worry,” she mummers in a relaxing tone. “You’re my little girl. I’m gonna take care of you.”

With these words she pulls off his dress and plays with the chain, before she bites the skin between his shoulder blades. He gasps and arches and her hand pushes him down again. Her nails scratch at the small of back and she licks and sucks at the spot she bit. It feels bruised, and she repeats the process on his shoulder blade area, until he starts shivering. She slides down and her hands cup his ass cheeks, massages them in whorls until he starts grinding down on the sofa. She slides down lower and kisses his ass cheeks, and he’s whole body is going mad, pulsating with her touches. She bites the ends of his ass cheeks, slides even lower and suck on the back of his knees, grapples at his feet and tickles them too and he’s starting to pant.

“Please, Natasha,” he whispers. “Please.”

“Where’s the lube?” Natasha asks.

“Uhm.”

All the way in the bedroom. He sighs, getting ready to break the mood again and then remembers Kan saying –

He reaches underneath the couch and fumbles around until his hand closes around a bottle of lube. He brings it out and she takes it without comment on its placement.

“Gonna make you wet,” she whispers almost tauntingly. “Gonna make you so wet for me. Turn around.”

He turns around, not worrying about her falling off, and she rewards him with more direct touches now. She pinches his nipples, takes them in her mouth and takes her time playing with them until they almost hurt, and then nipples at his throat. It’s good. It’s perfect and he moans, grinding against her until she thrusts in two of her thin fingers into hiss ass. Her callouses are like leather and he moans louder and she silences him with her mouth, swallowing all of his moans, all of his air, all of his neediness, all of his resistance, and even though it’s just two fingers and necking, it still feels like it takes everything for him not to come, not to cry and the world is gone to him, the two of them are laying in a boat floating on sweet nothing.

Her other hand joins the other and pulls his dripping cock out of his underwear. He involuntarily thrusts his hips forwards. She’s been teasing him for so long that the sensation of her hard grip feels so intense he almost comes right away.

He throws his head back as she adds two more fingers and her cheeks are red. They’re red and her lips are red and puffy, as if she has been biting them, her eyes are black and glassy.

He can’t help but reach out and stroke her cheek, feel how hot and close to sweating it is.

She starts jerking her hand and his mouth gapes open as she cruelly efficiently makes him come, the white thick seed pumping out of his slit and rolling down his dick as her other hand quickly and roughly fingers him and he can’t stop coming. He closes his eyes and cries out as her fingers draw it out and draw it out, until his whole cock becomes slippery and wet with his come.

Finally he dares look down at himself and his red cock looks obscene, glistening all over with his seed, as if someone had poured vanilla frosting all over it.

She bows down and licks up a stripe and he shivers violently, even though her tongue is clement.

She lets go of his dick, and it stays hard. He starts to sit up, reaching out for her and she pushes him down again. “Condoms,” she demands, but reaches underneath the couch before he can answer.

She finds a package and rips it open with her teeth. After having wiped his dick with a handkerchief from the table, she pinches the top of the condom and slides it on and finally gets on him.

The tightness around him only darkens his craving, his demand for her satisfaction and he can’t help but grab her around the waist as she starts to ruthlessly ride him. She slaps his hands away and writhes on him, rambunctiously fucks herself on him and rubs at her clit until she screams and tightens around him. Her chest shivers and he takes advantage of her oblivion to touch her breasts, thump her nipples and stroke her sides.

She doesn’t let herself dwell in the aftershocks. She lays down on her back on the other side of the couch, opening her legs invitingly and he crawls forward, bows his head towards the warmth, wetness and smell of her between her legs.

When his jaw is aching and her breasts and chest are dewy with sweat, she finally drops down and pants. Red lipstick stains are all over her cunt, her lips. Red lipstick is all over him, looking like bruises and love bites in the dimmed light of the TV. He feels amazed and kind of scared, but she’s warm and silent and for now he closes his eyes.

\----

The morning after Steve wakes up from the sound of a soft click. At the same time he blinks his eyes open, Natasha does the same and Kan turns away from the bed tapping on a phone which looks like something T’Challa would own.

Natasha stares at Kan for a second, probably debating whether she should beat the shit out of him, but instead she gets up, gathers her things, puts her clothes on and leaves without a word.

Kan spends the morning cleaning the nail polish off Steve’s nails and cleaning Steve’s face with makeup wipes, while Steve soaks in the tub.

“People won’t notice you taking things away if you give them something they greed for in return, Steven,” Kan explains as he clips Steve’s nails. Steve can do it for himself, but doing small things like this seems to comfort Kan and it often reminds Steve of how he would care for Ian when he was a toddler; moisturize him in oil during those warm, dusty days, cut his nails, comb and pick his hair from parasites, clean his body from dirt. All those things toddlers couldn’t do by themselves.

“She was in control,” Steve states. Not to make himself feel better, but because it perplexes him that Natasha ruined her own job for a lay; even convincing him to continue their act after he tried to pull away.

Kan squirts conditioner in his palm and massages it into Steve’s hair and doesn’t answer.

“You gave her a chance to self-release,” Kan finally states. “Of course she was in control; we didn’t trick her into anything; she’s far too smart for that and it’d be wrong. She just picked her fantasy over her job.”

Steve nods. He hasn’t really thought that much about it, but how Kan says it makes sense.

“I let her touch me, while I was unsure if she was still with Bucky,” Steve admits. “It feels like this … this feeling of not being here is becoming worse. How could I do that? To Bucky?”

Kan measures him with his eyes and then cleans his conditioned hands in the tub water. His fingers are pruning up. “Well, either you really didn’t care, or, you understand that Natasha is an adult and that Bucky is an adult. How their relationship works is none of our business, and would you really think that Natasha would do something as stupid as to cheat with her partner’s best buddy?”

“No,” Steve says, shaking his head, but it still nags him. “I should’ve asked though. I should’ve made sure. Instead it wasn’t on my mind at all. That scares me.”

The bubbles on the water glisten in blue and violet and neon green. He sees more shades in there, shades he can’t quite describe to anyone who doesn’t have enhanced vision.

“Steve,” Kan softly prods. “I… Steve, maybe you should… seek help for this. For how you feel. I promise you, doing so is not a defeat.”

But Steve is already shaking his head. “Too dangerous. HYDRA will find out and use my weaknesses against me. Use Ian against me. I can’t have that.”

He’s not strong enough for that.

“Please, Steve,” Kan begs. “You deserve better than this.”

“Than what?” Steve yells, sitting up in the tub, swiping water at Kan.

Kan’s grey shirt is stained dark. His eyes are sore. “You’re in pain.”

Steve doesn’t see why that matters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Primer:
> 
>  
> 
> [Natasha used to have the biggest crush on Steve.](http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/nearmiss5-2.jpg) My headcannon is that Steve, to Natasha, is the one who got away.
> 
>  
> 
> i would really like to know what you guys think. kinda depressing to post into a silent void TT__TT


	8. Scared

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I shouldn’t have slept with Natasha,” Steve says. “Everything will be wrong now.”
> 
> “What do you mean?” Kan asks, tasting the sauce and adding coco milk.
> 
> “Like with Wanda,” Steve mummers, staring at the ceiling. “I…”

Instead of continuing to talk about it, Kan finds the mead bottle and they get tipsy.

“You never do casual sex?” Kan asks him.

“No,” Steve shrugs. “Never felt the. Uh. Need to.”

“Never,” Kan chews the words.

“I guess some people move me,” Steve admits. “Just not for very long.”

“I understand,” Kan answers.

“Do you really?” Steve asks. After all there had been so many names when Steve had asked. It had almost been surreal. Anything from Susan Storm to Matt Murdock and either the Avengers have far more LGBT+ people than Steve had knew about or the universe Kan’s from is just a lot more open about their queerness. “When you talk about all the people you’ve slept with…”

Kan shrugs. “I have bad habits. Sex is… it’s the way I communicate. Express myself. Get to know people better. It’s rarely about being actually sexually attracted to someone.”

“You’re not afraid people will use you?”

Kan shakes his head. “Once upon a time, they did. I can rarely just have fun with someone. People invite other things into bed with us: Greed, jealousy, anger, sadness. And sometimes, as Bucky said, I’m just ‘a mistake people want to make’. But at that time, I needed confirmation from people in a way I don’t anymore.”

Steve looks up at him. “Is that what you’re afraid will happen to me.”

Kan looks down at him and reaches out to softly stroke Steve’s hair. “It already has. You think Natasha think the two of you are dating now?”

Steve sees the point. Natasha probably only sees him as a mess-up; a one night stand not to be spoken about. Probably why she was gone the day after.

They’re both sober in the evening, and Steve feels his mood drop. He shouldn’t have slept with Natasha. He shouldn’t have been so careless.

“What’s wrong,” Kan asks as he fries vegetables in cream. Steve is sitting by the kitchen table, silent.

“I shouldn’t have slept with Natasha,” Steve says. “Everything will be wrong now.”

“What do you mean?” Kan asks, tasting the sauce and adding coco milk.

“Like with Wanda,” Steve mummers, staring at the ceiling. “I…”

“What about Wanda?” Kan asks.

“I divulged,” Steve whispers. “And she…”

Kan puts down the big spoon and turns around. “Talk to me, Steve.”

“She kissed me. We kissed. We slept together,” Steve admits and touches his lips. “Before that my memories just... they weren't reliable. I kept getting hallucinations about me being stuck in the ice, reliving Bucky's death and I can't breathe... In the hallucination, she pulls me up from the ice and gives me CPR. And then… she deleted her memory of it. All of it."

“She broke down,” Kan guesses, his lips having gotten thin. “She manipulated your memories and actions to be with her.”

“She manipulated her own too,” Steve answers.

“Steve,” Kan says. “Look at me.”

Steve stops staring at the ceiling.

“I’m sorry,” Kan says. “That’s a shitty thing which happened to you. Was any of it real?”

Steve frowns in confusion. “I don’t … I don’t really know. To this day, I don’t know if it was real or just… something she did.”

\----

Around midnight it seems like a good idea to go out; around 2 am it sounds like a brilliant idea to go to a club. Steve’s has gotten a nice five o'clock _shadow, and his hair has gotten too long, his bangs hanging down over his eyes and framing his face. They buy a colored hairspray and use 20 minutes in a public bathroom coloring Kan’s long hair and eyebrows cinnabar red._

They find someone named Cherry in the sex club. She’s a pudgy woman in her younger thirties with a Puerto Rican accent and a swelling rack, round tummy, cute short legs and long, black hair. She sits with them for a while and if she recognizes them as Captain Americas, she doesn’t mention it. It’s odd how people tend not to recognize Steve when he’s with Kan. Probably because no one expects Captain America to have twin.

When their bodies are warm with laughter and Cherry isn’t nervous anymore, Steve leans into Kan and whispers: “Let’s ask her to take us home.”

Kan looks at Steve as if he’s crazy. Then he looks at Cherry, and then at Steve, and then he sighs. “Are you sure?”

Steve nods. This is alright; there’s no history with her, no mutual friends. Cherry is a lovable stranger, whom they only started talking to because she looked lonely by herself. He looks at Cherry, her black eyes scanning them over in puzzlement, her cheeks red from the heat of the room. Her curly hair gathers around her golden shoulders. Her crop top is cute, black and green with red intricate arabesques on it, her gray jeans highwaisted.

She pouts her red lips at them. “What are you two talking about?”

Steve looks at her and this doesn’t have to be complicated. He’s not using her. As Kan has mentioned, they’re all adults and her decisions are her own, her body is her own. It doesn’t matter that he is Captain America and he has an image to uphold; he burned off his whole shrine off anyway because he is done being frozen in the past.

Besides, Kan is here and Kan is more experienced than Steve. If things go sideways, they’ll figure it out together.

“Cherry, do you want to rent a room with us?” Steve politely asks.

She blushes. “I thought you two were brothers.”

Kan smiles at her, and it looks boyish and charming. “We’re not, but don’t worry, we get it a lot.”

They find a room in a nearby hotel, and it doesn’t take long for them to corner her between them, Kan kissing her mouth while Steve kisses his neck, feeling his hand down her chest, finding the zones that Natasha had focused on, on his own body and makes Cherry gasp into Kan’s smirking lips. Steve continues to low-key try to lead her attention away from Kan’s mouth by driving his fingers through her hair, licking at her ear lobe.

Steve hasn’t tried a threesome before, but it’s only a matter of touching and caressing the places Kan doesn’t already have his hands on. It’s actually kind of cozy, like creating a painting together but with more excitement involved, more pleasure and self-fulfillment through making Cherry feel good.

Which makes Steve realize that this isn’t so much about Cherry, but more about feeling closer to Kan, feeling the satisfaction of working together to make someone feel good. It should be weird, but Kan frees a hand and hooks their fingers together as if he reads Steve’s thoughts.

After what feels like an hour of foreplay, Cherry is dripping wet and they both manage to get inside her. This, Steve has never tried before; the tight space shared with a cock just as hard and big as his, and Cherry is trying her best not to scream and failing and Kan is helpfully directing Steve’s pace with his hands so they won’t hurt her too much, but she looks gone, her head and neck and chest is blushing through her golden undertones, her eyes are watery and mouth constantly letting drawn out moans out and her hair smells like mint and vanilla, the combination refreshing and sweet at the same time.

There’s sweat on her stomach and ass cheeks when she’s done and jerks them off in her hands. That last moment does feel surrealistic, like some dumb porn movie, but her face is a lot more content than a porn star’s, a lot safer and more relaxed.

Kan and Steve mumble back and forth as she sleeps between them, sliding their hands down her body like she’s a big cat they’re petting and it’s good. It’s so good. Steve doesn’t feel alone anymore, and before he falls asleep he realizes that he doesn’t want anyone’s confirmation by this. He just needs this little moment, this type of space, where nothing hurts.

\----

When they leave the hotel, saying goodbye to a sleepy Cherry and having paid for the room, it’s 5 am and they’ve already gotten quite drunk again. Instead of going home, they arrange themselves in Central Park with the bottle hidden in a paper bag, and look at the sun go up. They stopped by a 24/7 store and got some bread and they feed the ducks and the dawning light makes the lake look like a golden-orange mirror of light. It’s really nice and silent, except the whole cops-might-drop-by-and-see-them-drinking-in-public-area-and-Steve’s-image-will-be-ruined-(again) threat. It doesn’t matter either way. He’s happy and one more scandal won’t ruin him forever. If he survived Civil War, he can survive them catching him drinking in public spaces.

Steve giggles and Kan shoves at him.

“We need to go home soon,” Steve states around 6 AM, because he feels like one of them has to, but he doesn’t make any move to leave.

“Psst,” Kan says. “Nobody is waiting up for us. Look at that duck, Steve. Look at it. It looks like a Greg.”

“What? No, it looks like a John,” Steve laughs and Kan passes over the bottle and Steve takes a sip of the strong liquid. “Damn, I’m drunk.”

Kan giggles and swipes at Steve’s hair. “But it’s good, right?” Kan asks looking to the side at Steve. “God knows I needed this too.”

Steves grins crookedly. “Yeah. Family dad probably doesn’t have much time for drinking trips.”

“Nah,” Kan agrees and rubs his eyes. There is still some glitter on his brows and hairlines from the club. “I mean, we … me and my husband, we’re pretty loaded. Like. Really. Lots of money. Sometimes I worry that it’ll… make them… I don’t know.”

Steve squints at him. “You’re afraid they’ll become spoiled?”

“Yeah,” Kan confirms. “You know the other day? My second biggest kid asked me: ‘Hey Papa, can I get an Audi?’”

“Guess again.”

“My exact words. What did he expect?”

Steve smiles at Kan and it doesn’t hurt to know that Kan didn’t fail where Steve did. Kan’s kids are alive and well and bless the Lord for just letting that happen to at least one of them.

“You never talk about things like that,” Steve says, not blind to the fact that his current predicament probably has something to do with that, but he’s still curious. “You never talk about yourself.”

Kan looks at him. “Neither do you, Steve.”

Steve shrugs.

“I guess spoiling Ian too much wasn’t really a problem?” Kan asks.

Steve shrugs. The memories don’t carry their usual sting right now, but they still ache. “Nah. First year, we had to go hungry all the time. We were always focusing on, you know. Not getting killed by mutates. Finding safe shelter and then _proper_ shelter. Had to starve most of the time to keep him alive, while Zola’s virus was spreading and eating away at my chest. It was hard.”

Kan looks very solemnly at him. “You did your best.”

Steve flinches. He hates those words. It feels like an excuse of how he should’ve done better than that. “I don’t know. I feel like. He stopped crying of hunger when he was six months, you see. What child learns to stop crying from hunger that early?”

Kan doesn’t reply, only keeps looking at him.

Steve sniffs. “Maybe it was because he figured out that crying would give out our location to predators. We were always on the run, almost died several times because of…”

He reaches for the bottle, but it’s nowhere to be seen.

Steve takes a deep breath. “He always said he didn’t want to leave that place, you know. To him, that was his home. He thought that hell hole was his home, because he didn’t think anything better existed.”

Kan reaches over and ruffles Steve’s hair.

“Guess he got what he wanted,” Steve finishes and he doesn’t cry.

\----

When they get to Avengers Tower (since it’s closer than the apartment in Brooklyn) it’s 7 am and Steve has lost all will to walk. He lies down in the common room and refuses to go any further.

“Get up, you slob,” Kan scolds him but doesn’t wait long before he joins him. They pull the blanket off the couch and fall asleep right away.

They wake up 8 am at Tony poking them with his foot, suit sleek and hair slick, his red sunglasses reminding Steve of Murdock. Steve blinks blearily up at Tony, still feeling very tired but in a drunken comfortable way. He has stolen the entire blanket from Kan, who’s looking up at Tony with tired, red eyes, his hand beneath his white t-shirt to scratch at his belly.

Tony looks down at him in annoyance. “How come you don’t have any chest hair?” he asks.

Kan blinks up at him and makes a face, but as always he doesn’t answer.

“It’s because he’s a pretty boy.” Steve starts chuckling. “Or a teenager.”

“Fuck you, strawberry nipples,” Kan shoots and pokes at Steve’s hard nipple through the shirt.

“You’re practically Niall Horan,” Steve taunts.

“Oh you did not.”

“Yes.” Steve starts to laugh. “Yes I did.”

Kan smacks him and Steve doesn’t take him seriously because he’s laughing and Kan rolls on top of him. Steve quickly gets him down but after a minute of wrestling, Kan has gotten him pinned again.

“You know I’m more of an adult in the areas that matter, soldier,” Kan smirks.

“Is that so?” Steve’s smile turns into a leer.

“Maybe,” Kan hums.

“Aaaaand my eyes are burning,” someone says and both Kan and Steve look up.

Tony is staring at them like he hates everything in the world. Carol is laughing into her hand and Peter is holding his eyes.

“They’re drunk,” Tony explains.

Kan giggles and lowers down until he’s lying on top of Steve. After a second there’s a snore. Steve is closing his eyes as well, and starting to get comfortable and then he feels a sharp tug.

“Get up, boys,” Carol coos, cheery albeit a little tense. “Time for bed.”

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, Carol,” Steve slurs as Carol easily gets him on his feet. “I shouldn’t have – public area, oh my god, Tony – “

“Tony already left, but he said don’t worry about it,” Carol dismisses. “Relax, Cap, I can handle seeing you two drunk.”

“I can’t,” Peter protests as he holds Kan’s weight up. “I didn’t know you became a kisser, Cap.”

Kan snorts with laughter. “If you knew.”

“Shut up, pretty boy,” Steve grunts.

Kan continues to giggle.

\----

After that, they become a little more openly affectionate. Kan smiles fondly at Steve over breakfast, Steve massages Kan’s feet during movie nights, Steve pets Kan’s hair and the Avengers are trying and mostly failing at not looking weirdly at them.

It’s all good though. For a while Steve is good, even though Ian is still gone. But it becomes like before – Steve grieves, Steve’s sad, but he’s able to carry on. Kan becomes a bit more comfortable around the other Avengers, even offers Tony coffee some mornings. Jet Black drops by often, but never for a long time and Sam continues his day job, looking out for her. She’s busy exploring New York and Steve respects that, even though he wished she would be here more often.

And well. Natasha piqued Steve’s sexual interest in the Avengers, despite how he still feels bad about it. It’s not like he hasn’t ever noticed that they’re all very well-made attractive people, but he’s always had someone else to focus his energy on, always had a certain professional discourse when it came to handling the Avengers, despite most of them being the closest to a family he has. There have been occasional wet dreams about Sam and Tony, and even Thor, but those had always made him feel guilty, especially when he had a lady.

But now, it’s different. Steve’s back in his own world and he has missed it and he feels like if he doesn’t take the chance now, he will never have it again. Sharon is gone, Ian is gone, and Captain America is on vacation. When will he otherwise get the chance?

“So who would you pick,” Kan had explained, shampooing Steve’s hair while Steve had scrubbed his back. “Of the Avengers.”

“I … I don’t know.”

“Who moves you?”

“Uhm. Sam. Tony. Hercules. Thor.”

“No women?”

Kan brushes Steve’s hair back with his fingers, making sure no conditioner gets near Steve’s eyes (it’s painfully obvious that Kan is a dad sometimes) and then closes his arms around Steve’s waist. Steve’s hands on Kan’s back still.

“My female colleagues deal with enough as it is, so I haven’t been looking.”

The same night Kan leaves him alone in their apartment and goes to “chat with Thor” and comes back with two bottles of mead. He had looked flushed and very satisfied and Steve had thrown pillows at him.

“He says he always wondered what it’d be like being with you,” Kan tells him, as he casually licks at the head of Steve’s cock. “Says that you’re a very beautiful warrior, Stevie. That he’d be interested.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Primer:
> 
> Steve had an sorta relationship with Wanda right before M-day. [Due to the mental strain, Wanda would morph reality. ](http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/avengerswandalove5l.jpg)[It came to a point where Steve doubted reality. ](http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/avengerswandalove5e.jpg)


	9. Set Free

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor turns his head and eyes Steve. His helmet is one the grass besides Mjølnir, and his hair is thicker than Kan’s and a more golden shade. It’s not for fun they called him Goldilocks in the beginning. “Methinks it as if thou are… more…” Thor frowns, trying to find the right words as he stands up. “As if thou are afire. Alive, burning, but only for so long.”
> 
> Steve tilts his head, scrutinizing Thor’s calm expression. For a moment he is hit with doubt, but he shrugs it off. “Going to take me for a joyride before it’s over then?”

Steve wakes up because of the sound of… grinding? Almost biting. Someone chewing something. He blinks his eyes open, and stares at the ceiling, takes in the darkness, while listening closely to the sound. He’s still, waiting for movement in the darkness, for the sound to change, and it takes a minute before it clicks that the sound is actually coming from Kan.

Steve rolls to the side, and Kan’s back is turned towards him, his body naked, without the duvet. Steve sits up, turns on the light and puts a gentle hand on Kan’s arm. Kan’s hands are loosely holding his necklace into his neck, the pearls in his mouth, his teeth grinding on the pearls. His quick breathing tells Steve that either he is suffering a nightmare or he’s awake.

Steve reaches out, and gentle tugs the necklace away from his hands, lets it fall free. The beads’ paint is slightly scratched, but they don’t show signs of cracks. Steve closes his arms around Kan’s chest, and leans his forehead into Kan’s neck.

“His heartbeat stuttered,” Kan chokes his voice thick.

Steve blinks in confusion for a second.

“I can feel his heartbeat through the necklace,” Kan confesses. “I was sleeping, and then suddenly it just – “

He sounds like he’s crying. Steve shushes him and kisses his shoulder. “He’s fine now.”

“What is he doing?” Kan whispers. “I need to know. I don’t like him alone out there. Someone should watch his back.”

“Someone are,” Steve assures him, because he knows Kan is a mother hen and that he wouldn’t leave his husband alone out there.

“I want to go back so much,” Kan breathes. “But… I know it all ends, if I die. The prophecy is too strong.”

“What prophecy?”

But Kan doesn’t answer, and after a while Steve strokes his chest, whispering: “Go to sleep.”

\----

The next day Kan still looks shaken, and when he urges Steve to eat his voice shakes. Steve eats it all, though he feels ready to throw up afterwards.

Thankfully, over the course of the day, Kan slowly simmers down from his anxiety, and returns to his routine only slightly pale. Steve tries to be there for him in the same friendly silent way Kan is always there for him, and he wonders if it even helps.

They do rounds in the swimming pool and take a nap. In the evening, Kan becomes restless though and uses the showerhead’s different setting as a vibrator and fucks Steve with a plug. After that, Kan finally seems at ease. When Thor checks in, Kan winks at Steve before going to approach Thor on Steve’s behalf.

Steve is nervous, but he is sure about this. He’s tired of waiting for the right time, or keep suppressing his desires. He feels like he doesn’t have anything left. That’s how he can just screw it all; he needs to get away from the past, away from the expectations laid upon him since he pulled on the cowl. After so long, he feels like he has forgotten why those expectations were so important to uphold in the first place.

Because he needs to release. He needs to be… free.

\----

When Kan comes back, he informs that Thor doesn’t want to agree to anything unless Steve seals the deal face to face. Kan very much encourages this. Thor and Steve agree on meeting outside, far away from the Tower because in no way does Steve want any part of Tony’s security monitoring this, not this sort of meetup, so on the subway Steve goes.

He meets Thor in a little secluded area of a park in Queens, surrounded by rosehip bushes. He’s sitting in front of a small, artificial pool of water. The water is clear. Steve can see the pebbles clearly despite how much the water glistens and catches the light of the sun. The low sound of the buzzing of bees is all around them, the pinkish lilac rose petals swaying as the small insects flutter around them. The wind is soft and not cool enough for a hot day like this. Steve wonders if Sam is out flying with Redwing.

Steve has never been here before, but the way Thor lies relaxed on the grass tells him that this isn’t the first time the god has sought out solitude here.

“Hey,” Steve greets as he settles down besides the thunder god. His eyes flicker down on Thor’s cape and not for the first time, he wonders how Thor keeps the grass stains away. Steve can’t count the number of spots he has scrubbed off his uniform.

“Greetings, Captain,” Thor answers, turning his head and giving Steve a warm smile.

And then the nervousness sets in. Steve is a trapped between acting like an Avenger and handling the situation like he’d handle a mission, and acting like a gentleman, trying to soften himself and open up in the way he usually only does when he talks to women expressing their interest. It’s difficult and kind of ridiculous because this is Thor, and that was part of the reason why Kan wanted Steve to start out with him.

“You don’t have to play games with him, Stevie,” he had said, and clapped Steve’s back. “You’re gonna be happy about that, if you keep this … experimenting phase going. Besides, Thor isn’t a gossip.”

“Thou art a changed man these days, Captain,” Thor lets Steve know. “Meseems like thou have aged since I saw thou last.”

Steve twitches. It’s the closest it has been on anyone noticing anything different about him. “How so?” Steve asks.

Thor turns his head and eyes Steve. His helmet is one the grass besides Mjølnir, and his hair is thicker than Kan’s and a more golden shade. It’s not for fun they called him Goldilocks in the beginning. “Methinks it as if thou are… more…” Thor frowns, trying to find the right words as he stands up. “As if thou are afire. Alive, burning, but only for so long.”

Steve tilts his head, scrutinizing Thor’s calm expression. For a moment he is hit with doubt, before he shrugs it off. “Going to take me for a joyride before I burn out then?”

Thor’s eyes widen. Steve doesn’t quite understand why people are wearing that expression around him so often lately. Steve tilts his head further and meets the myth’s eyes, trying to radiate coolness and surety.

“I like thine companion,” Thor lets Steve know in an almost distant voice. He reaches out and touches Steve’s hair, letting the hand slide down to the back of Steve’s right ear. “But not as much as I like thou, Captain.”

Steve looks down at Thor’s thick wrist, biting his lip.

“Take me away from here,” Steve orders. Thor grabs his helmet and Mjølnir. His arms wrap around Steve and they take off.

\----

When they land in a white oak forest, the sun is starting to set. They’re in a clearing, not too far away from a meadow, and Thor loosens his cape and spreads it on the grass, and throws his helmet to the side. He sits down on the grass, besides the cape, and pulls Steve onto of him.

The roughness makes Steve look up at Thor with a startled face. His hands close around Thor’s biceps, and he looks down between them. Their muscular flat torsos are warm and slightly clammy underneath their clothes, Steve’s jeans far too tight for this dance to play out like he would’ve wanted it.

Steve presses his longing body into Thor’s, starting from his shoulder, down to his chest. His abs flex in a wave-like motion and the movement ends in his hips, pressing their crotches together.

Thor rumbles in a satisfied manner and Steve’ skin is burning, screaming, longing for touch, for pain – it’s all the same in the end. The final ounce of his nervousness evaporates as Thor’s body heat overwhelms him and he grinds his body against Thor’s. Thor’s not budging – he’s almost 700 pounds after all – but the movement makes him shiver. Steve’s fingers slide up to the side of Thor’s neck and he dares to look up and gasps as Thor’s gaze very intensely meet his, his chest starting to feel ablaze. He leans back, supporting himself on Thor’s knees so Thor can see Steve grind down him, the roll ending in his thighs.

Thor’s corn blue eyes turn black and make Steve feel like dismiss all shame, wanting nothing more than to drive Thor to the edge. It’s like an aroma hits the fan and Steve suddenly scents something that fills him with vertigo, makes him want to grope Thor in all the right places just to see the reaction. All thoughts about the world waiting outside this forest disappears as his whole purpose, all his want and desire pour into the wish of making Thor feel him, and not being able to feel anything but him. He isn’t shy and his hips move with purpose now, greedier and more daring, and God he feels Thor get hard right against Steve’s flanks, the immortal feels so big already –

The air in Steve’s lungs feels thick in his arousal, and he feels himself get flushed by the hard thing poking him where he really want it to get in deep and just ruthlessly –

He lets go of Thor’s knees and puts his full weight on Thor so the roll of his hips gets more intentional. Thor’s breath hitches and his hands raise up to grab Steve by the hips, and the grasp almost feels too hard, Thor properly doesn’t even notice, but it’s still good, it’s still enough to send Steve’s mind straight into lust and he feels himself get hard in return. Thor growls and tips Steve forwards, so Steve has to grab Thor around the neck so he won’t lose his balance. Steve leans forwards, glancing his lips on Thor’s temples, the line of his square jar, his neck that smells like sweat and want and man and at last he gently nips at Thor’s ear, feeling Thor’s thick hands tighten around his waist.

Steve lets go of Thor’s neck, and starts fumbling after the clasps, flicking the rivets open, until the armor vest falls off and Steve can grip the tight, black undershirt underneath the armor piece and pull that off too. He throws it to the side and can’t get his hands on Thor’s pumped chest fast enough, slide the palms of his hands over the round pectorals, and let his fingers curl, nails scratching the pink flesh. No red half moons show up despite Steve’s intent. He intensifies his grinding and does what Kan advised him not to - Kan said Steve should stay focused and work on prolonging this scene - but all he can feel is the steady throb in his blood, the pulse in his veins and he wants to get off, is actively trying to, he wants to come through their barriers of clothing like a teenager, and maybe Thor will let him give him a blowjob to make up for it.

But just as he feels a serious spark of climax, Thor grabs him around the neck until their faces are merely an inch away from each other, and Steve doesn’t need more encouragement. His lips seek out Thor’s and Thor closes his eyes as their lips meet. It’s soft, yet wet, the clumsiness of the first ten seconds only making Steve more eager, until he has taken over the kiss and Thor’s head is slightly tilted back, returning the kiss but weakly and in an almost passive manner.

Lord. Steve is making out and frotting with Thor, but he can’t even think about the consequences, he just wants to make Thor’s lips his, Thor’s will his, Thor’s body his.

Just for an hour.

Steve releases Thor’s lips, just to breathe for a second and then rotates, so his back is against Thor’s chest. He puts his hands on Thor’s knees, gently spreads them open so he can glide in-between Thor’s thick thighs, and it feels good, Thor’s burning underneath all his pants, his arousal obvious, its smell powerful, as Steve moves and grinds his ass against Thor’s crotch, and it feels so good. Thor’s hands land on Steve’s thighs and Steve shivers, arching his back so he can put the palm of his hand on the back of Thor’s head and tighten his fist in the blond person’s mane. He always loved long hair, remembers never being able to keep his hands out of Sharon’s. Thor’s hands tighten in the creases between Steve’s thighs and ass and he groans.

One more vicious press against Thor’s crotch gets Thor growling, and then Steve is pushed forwards. He lands on all four on the grass and inhales deeply as the moist earth flattens under his palms. Behind him he can hear Thor peel off his black pants and pulls Steve closer by the ankles.

“Thor,” Steve breathes, looking over his shoulder, and Thor grips Steve around the hips and it’s his turn to grind on Steve, his turn to wash his desire all over the soldier and Steve’s whole figure shivers and jerks as Thor lets Steve just how hard he is.

“Please, Thor,” Steve groans. “I’m ready. I’m prepped.”

Thor hisses and tugs Steve’s tight jeans off, baring Steve’s flesh.

Two fingers test him out, finds the handle of the plug and smoothly pulls it out, Steve groaning at the quickness of it, can’t help following the plug with his ass. Thor circles Steve’s rim with the tip for a moment, before throwing besides his helmet, and Steve keens, longing. He’s knows that he is probably still a bit red from Kan not too long ago, and Thor’s knowingly touches the swollen skin.

Thor strokes his cock a couple times, but Steve is getting impatient and dissatisfied that Thor so rudely takes away the plug just to sit there and need time to get ready.

_People won’t notice you taking things away if you give them something they greed for in return, Steven._

Steve turns around. “Let me,” he mummers, and pulls his own jeans down the rest of the way. When he has gotten Thor down on his cape, Steve turns around and sits on Thor’s thighs with his back towards Thor again, and grinds down on Thor’s balls.

“Give it to me, Thor.”

Finally Thor damns it all and directs the head of his dick at Steve’s hole. It’s tight and Thor’s cock feels hot red against his hole, but the head slips inside and Steve gets the rest of it in, even when the size of it makes him choke. His arousal spikes and he says: “Please, fuck me, I need you so bad.”

Thor moans and softly starts thrusting his hips. In this position his thick cock is rubbing against Steve’s prostate and Steve can’t help but whine, and try to fuck himself on the stiff dick, just to meet Thor’s thrusts a little harder than the myth intends and Thor groans, grabbing a piece of Steve’s ass and smacking it.

“Is the view good?” Steve gasps. Please, don’t let him have caught onto Kan’s dirty talking habits. “Bet it looks real nice seeing your cock disappear into my asshole like that. Bet it’s red and swelling even more and I- I can feel it bending every time it gets inside my tight hole. My tight fucking hole. Can you feel me clenching around you? Can you feel me taking all of you?”

Thor groans and his hands around Steve’s hips slam Steve into him and Steve cries out.

“Yes, that looked good, didn’t it?” Steve moans. “Do it again. Get your boy into me as quickly and as hard as possible. Ah. Ah! _Ahn_. Yeah, Thor, please – oh, that feels so good, pound your fucking cock into me, mark me up, make me feel it until tomorrow.”

By this point Thor is roughly pounding into him, again forgetting the strength his body holds, and may be plunging into Steve a little bit too hard, in a way that makes Steve’s teeth rattle and his back ache, but he can’t bring himself to say anything, not when the strength of this creature is what makes his world shake. Soon Thor is going so fast his cock starts to feel like a burn that spreads to Steve’s balls and cock. Steve’s arms are straining to keep his weight up, his shoulders from plummeting into the grass. When Steve finally loses strength and falls down on his shoulders, his ass continually getting rammed into since Thor is still holding his hips up, Thor sharply pulls him up by the hair, ramming in deep.

It’s too hot for this, too many sensations, too much pleasure overwhelming his whole body, not just his hole and thighs, but his fingers, his toes, his cock hard against his stomach, his shaking knees and pulsating chest.

Thor grabs Steve’s dick and directly thumbs around Steve’s slit and Steve jerks and shakes because it feels like too much right there and his balls clench up. His climax is thick in Thor’s hand. Thor croons like something is hurting him and starts rearranging the Captain, so Steve is lying on his side with his knee lifted up, and Thor crawls as close to Steve’s entrance as possible. He nudges in his cock, deep, and starts grinding. Steve is too shaky and sensitive to really think much about it and can only comply as Thor starts fucking him roughly and mercilessly while staring at the place where his cock disappears into Steve’s ass, until Steve’s weight has flattened the grass and his hair sweaty. Thor shoves in deep, pressing them so tight together that it challenges Steve’s flexibility, and comes, his hips twitching and shaking until he sighs and lets go of Steve’s raised leg.

Steve’s loose and tired on the cape. Thor lies down besides him, kisses Steve until Steve can make sense of everything again. Thor pulls his (still hard) dick out and Steve feels come leak out and drip down his flanks. And this is good. He’s bruised, is sticky with seed, and he has spots of green grass and dirty everywhere, but the sun is setting in a way that colors the tree crowns golden. The wind sweeps through the meadow and it’s feels cool.

Steve nudges his body into Thor’s, and let’s Thor pull his arms tight around him, sheltering him from the cold darkness coming.

\----

Steve awakens in the evening because his phone is ringing. He’s all wrapped in Thor’s cape and body, feeling like a bud folded like this. The grass has become dewy. Hundreds of bugs have probably already fed of him, naked and exposed as he is, but he figures the cap has shielded him from the worst and that sleeping on the ground in the wild doesn’t really bother Thor either.

Steve gets out of the cape, Thor grunting as he moves, and picks up the phone.

“Where are you?” a voice Steve recognizes as Kan asks. He sounds worried.

“I’m,” Steve says and then frowns. The moon isn’t full enough for Steve to recognize the place. “I’m not sure.”

“Give me Thor,” Kan orders.

Steve reaches the phone to Thor and Thor grumbles when its sharp light hits his face.

“Hello,” Thor greets. Kan says something and Thor listens for a minute. “Surely. I apologize, mine friend, I must admit that time and our agreement … No, I am aware. Aye. We will be there within a moment. Aye.”

He reaches the phone back to Steve, looking slightly agitated.

“He’s going to bring you home, tell him which one,” Kan curtly informs.

“Where are you?” Steve asks.

“I’m still in the Tower since I can’t really leave without you, remember,” Kan answers. “But I can keep my head down until tomorrow, if you want to go to Brooklyn with Thor.”

“No, we’re coming to the Tower.”

“Alright, Stevie. Make sure to clean up everything, and to put the plug in the bag. The left pocket. Just throw out the plug, we’ll buy a new one, unless you want anyone in the tower to figure out what’s in the bag.”

Steve finds his jeans (they’re slightly ripped) and pulls a black small plastic bag out of his pocket, wondering when Kan stuffed his pocket with it and then shuffles around, searching for the plug, eventually finding it. The lube has insured that bugs, dirt and pollen have stuck onto it. It’s good that it’s getting thrown out; the cleanup would be hell. Afterwards, Steve walks behind a bush and pees, before finding napkins in the right pocket, moistening them with spit and cleaning his ass as well as he can. He puts the dirty napkins in the bag as well, puts on his clothes and then wakes up Thor.

Thor is sleepy and sort of grumpy, but his arm is tight around Steve as he sets off. Steve discharges the bag a safe distance away from the Tower and lets Thor fly him the rest of the way. They part ways when the elevator reaches the penthouse and Steve goes to shower, finding leaves and flower petals in his hair. It’s not long before he goes to find Kan, whom he finds in the common room, speaking with Sam in a lowered voice.

He goes back to bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Primer:  
> Steve's notions about leaving the past has something to do with his mother always telling him this; but him not having done it anyway, until him and Jet Zola decided to burn off Tony's Captain America shrine.


	10. Cannibalize

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony makes his move.

As Thor penetrates him, Steve’s chest rises in a gasp. Thor seems to want to take his time this time, watching Steve as he starts fucking him.

Someone knocks on the doorframe and Steve looks back to see Kan by the door, wearing a half-interested smile. “Still want me to join, boys?”

Steve makes grabby hands and Kan takes his time unclothing, sending Steve teasing glances and smirks as Steve impatiently waits. By the time Kan is spreading his knees around Steve’s neck, his ass turned towards Steve’s face, Steve’s thighs are shaking with every one of Thor’s sharp thrusts. It feels amazing, especially when Kan directs his cock head into Steve’s mouth and slowly but firmly starts to lower. His ball sack lays itself on Steve’s nose and the further Kan lowers the harder it is for Steve to breath and Kan seems to know it, because he only rocks his hips twice, once against Steve’s tongue and second directly down Steve’s throat. Thor groans as Steve chokes, his own fingers feeling like metal around Steve’s thighs and for a moment he imagines it being Iron Man holding him like this, imagines Iron Man with a nice, curved metal cock.

Kan pulls out and focuses on rubbing his leaking cockhead against Steve’s lips, Steve sticking out his tongue to catch the taste, whining for it, and Kan lowers down again, at the same time he leans towards Thor.

Thor crawls forwards on his knees to meet Kan’s lips, which crumples Steve’s body in-between theirs. Kan really dwells in the kiss he shares with Thor, and Steve’s blood starts to throb with the need for oxygen. Thor is so deep inside him in such a sweet and stingy way, and his legs vibrate and bend as he comes untouched on his stomach.

His vision darkens as he twitches through the aftershocks and Kan pulls out again. Steve gratefully gulps for air and Kan takes a fist of Steve’s hair and rolls his head around in a hard, but not painful grasp, then holding it still as he presses his hole against Steve’s mouth and Steve immediately lets his tongue out, rounding Kan’s hole with the tip and thrusts into Kan’s hole. Kan swirls his hips and Steve’s jaw is almost aching by the time Thor comes.

But Steve is getting awfully tired now and kind of spent. Usually he can hold out for much longer – need it much longer. Usually round 1 is only the beginning, but right now he can’t gather the energy or composure to be strained and twisted and drained for a second time.

He taps Kan’s knee thrice, and immediately Kan scoots away, turning around and catching Steve’s eyes. “What is it?” he asks, driving his fingers through Steve’s hair. His voice doesn’t convey any feeling but patience, and he sounds sincere.

Steve whispers: “I can’t go for another round. I don’t want him in here anymore. I want it to just be us two.”

Kan frowns and leans in closer. “One more time?”

Steve repeats with a shaking voice.

Kan nods once and looks up at Thor. “Did you have a good time?” he asks Thor.

Thor nods, looking at both of them in a speculating manner.

“Good,” Kan says. “Steve needs to be alone. You can go to my room.”

Thor nods once, his cheeks red. It takes a second for him to compose himself, but then he does get up. “Take your time,” he mildly instructs them and closes the door behind him. They hear him cross the hall to go crash in Kan’s room.

Kan immediately closes his arms around Steve, and Steve comfortably curls his hands around Kan’s arms, closing his eyes in exhaustion.

\-----

When they come home from grocery shopping, Steve’s apartment has been searched. The signs are subtle but there. There are two trackers on Steve’s shield, and several cameras and microphones. It takes hours to clean it up, and when they’re done, they don’t say anything. They can tell from the placements of the equipment that either SHIELD did this or someone from the Avengers.

“At least we threw out the plug in time,” Kan says, looking at the turned off TV.

Steve nods. “What about the condoms and lube?”

“Every healthy heterosexual man has those,” Kan answers.

“They don’t trust me,” Steve finally says.

“They’re just worried.” Kan stands up. “We should move back into the Tower.”

They move back into the Tower, and continue their routine like they don’t suspect anything, even though the Tower room has been raided as well.

They stop touching so much.

\----

“Let’s not run the long route today,” Kan suggests as they get their running shoes on. Steve doesn’t think much about this, sure in his ability to drag it out if need be (Kan always adjusts himself to Steve’s craves, whether Kan himself will admit it or not), even though it’s odd for Kan to suggest going easy. Steve doesn’t ask though. Kan has had a couple of rough days. He’s getting more depressed and anxious about no one coming for him. His anniversary was four days ago, and his husband said that he’d try his best to be here before that. Though the necklace tells Kan that his husband isn’t dead, it’s not enough to kill Kan’s anxiety. His restlessness transcends into longer and more vigorous scenes, which leaves Steve drained and high all the time. The afterglow Kan usually has after a scene – the content mood and easy smiles – wears off easier these days too, and when Sam or Jet drops by, Kan always goes into their bedroom until they leave instead of being there, watching them “creepily and silently” as Jet calls it.

Things are hard. Kan misses his kids and his husband and he obviously misses his world. He wants to go back, however it’s too bad that Kan mentioned an ominous prophecy, because it makes Steve convince Kan to stay on the path of being patient and not getting any smart ideas, when Kan gets seriously restless.

The run doesn’t go well. It actually hasn’t the past few days, but today Steve slows down after only 10 miles, and needs a break after 15. As he breathes heavily into his knees, Kan buys a bottle of water from a street vendor, and Steve drinks some of it, but his stomach protests so much that it feels impossible for him to chug it all down. He’s sweating a lot and feels pretty dizzy and they agree on turning around.

Half way through the run back the world starts spinning and Steve tilts into a picket fence and would’ve toppled over if Kan hadn’t grabbed him. Despite Steve’s protests, Kan catches a morning cab and they drive home, and then everything promptly goes to shit.

Kan is supporting Steve as they head for their room, because Steve is still swaying, pale in the face. Carol is sitting in her uniform, eating breakfast with Tony and Tony takes one look at them, before snapping: “You see that?”

Carol turns around and her dubious eyes turn sharp when she sees them. She slowly gets to her feet, and walks towards them.

“So what’s going on?” she asks Kan.

“Excuse me?” Kan politely utters.

“Don’t think we’re not onto you,” Carol coolly lets him know. “He looks worse and worse for every day, and we’re not having it anymore. You’re going away to quarantine, just make it easy on yourself and go without a fight.”

“Carol,” Steve sharply intrudes. “This isn’t any of your business.”

She looks hurt for a nanosecond, but it passes, only making her blue eyes hard as flint when she lets them set back on Kan.

Kan slowly lets go of Steve, and then turns his head to look reassuringly at Steve. “Things will be fine. They’re doing it for your own best.”

Steve opens his mouth and then lets it close as Carol leads Kan away.

\----

Later that evening, as Steve is catching up with paperwork in the common area, his hands shaking for some reason, Tony plops down beside him and looks at the muted television. He doesn’t even search for the remote. Steve doesn’t greet him or even look at him. He feels like a petulant child, an angry teenager, and he’s afraid that if he starts saying something all the bad words will flow out, and let it show how unreliable and mistrustful he is these days. He only had Kan to help him get out of his moods and now they have taken him away from Steve, even in a period of time where Kan was suffering too.  

The talk in the kitchen besides the common living room is constant, but low. Carol has informed the team that Kan is in quarantine and that “Steve is twitchy these days because of Sharon’s death, don’t talk to him about it”, so no one has entered the common room and no one has tried to approach him, despite constantly being nearby.

Tony’s voice is toneless: “You’re not eating, are you.”

It’s a statement, not a question. So he’s been watching a lot of footage. Steve wonders if he knows about him and Kan, but surely that would’ve come up instantly if things were like that. So Tony has tried to respect his privacy.

Steve sighs and rubs his temples, his anger evaporating. It’s not anyone’s fault but his own. If he had said something, just admitted that he is the problem, Kan wouldn’t have ended up in quarantine all alone. Everything is his fault, when will he realize that.

“When you stop eating, your body will start to cannibalize itself, Steve, even worse than the most of us because of your metabolism,” Tony informs in a matter of fact voice. “Your body is trying to compensate for the lacking nourishment and still keep its efficiency as level as always. But you’re starving, Steve. You’ve lost 25% of your body weight. Your hair is thinning, your skin tissue is softening, and that’s why you can’t run 13 miles without a break anymore. And I’m sorry I missed it, Steve, until it started to show.”

Steve stays silent.

“I know you’re grieving Sharon,” Tony says and puts his hand on Steve’s arm. “I know you’re going through a hard time. But please eat, Steve. Please accept help. I know someone you can talk to.”

Steve looks at him. “If you know it’s about Sharon, then why did you put Kan in quarantine?”

Tony impatiently puts his hands on his knees. “Because look at your reaction to it. The old Steve would understand why we did it, even agree, but now you’re so… temperamental. We’re just separating you two to make sure he doesn’t have you under some sort of mind control. After all, that’s Zola’s thing, isn’t it? You understand that, don’t you?”

Steve looks down. ‘The old Steve’. Right. Old Steve. In their eyes that man was here, not too long ago.

Steve takes a deep breath and looks up from his paperwork. He feels his face pinch, as he quotes: “’Feeling sorry for yourself won’t solve anything. If you try, just try, to find yourself a new life, I know you’ll work it out’.”

Tony frowns. “Who said that? Kan?”

Steve meets his eyes. “You did. After I was defrosted. Remember? You took me up to the rooftop to accept that this was my world now, and there was no use mourning the one I lost.”

Tony stares at him, horror slowly unfolding in his eyes.

“It was that advice which got me up last time,” Steve clarifies. “This time it’s just taking a little longer. If you let me go back to the field, I know I will snap out of it.”

“I don’t know about that, Steve,” Tony dubiously mutters.

“Then at least give me Kan back,” Steve snaps. “He hasn’t done anything and he’s already plenty depressed about being stuck here.”

“Yeah, fine,” Tony flares up. “Fine. We will look for bugs first, and _if_ we don’t find anything, we’ll let him go. But I’m not letting you back in the field before I know you won’t faint in the middle of it.”

“Oh, like how you bugged my apartment here and in Brooklyn?” Steve accuses, his voice rising. “And as if you haven’t keeled over on missions dozens of times before?”

“Steve, calm down,” Tony stresses, but he’s starting to sound anxious now.

“No, fuck you.” Steve gets up from the table, and starts gathering his files. “I won’t sit here and listen to you being so damn hypocritical about my health, which is something that started recently, when you’ve had more serious problems for the past 14 years. Now stop being so invasive. Hiring Natasha? Watching private footage of me? Telling Carol? Mind your own darn business, and leave me alone.”

“Steve, please don’t walk away,” Tony begs.

Steve would slam the door, if the doors weren’t automatic.

\-----

Tony isn’t one to give up. As Steve stalks towards his bedroom, Tony follows in quick steps, urging Steve to stop and talk to him. Steve acts as if he can’t hear.

He finally stops and shouts: “It’s just because it feels like I don’t even know you anymore.”

Steve stops, and he’s not so angry anymore, even though he’s still sad and frustrated. Because he gets it. Alright? The sleeping around, the headaches, the nightmares. It’s not like him. “The Old Steve.”

Steve doesn’t even know himself anymore. Of course the Avengers are alarmed.

Tony walks up to him, and Steve turns around.

“You’re drifting further and further away, and when we try to reach out, you tell us to mind our own business. You’re just walking around with that Kan guy, alone all day, locking your doors and not calling,” Tony continues. “Like we’re strangers or something.”

Steve looks at him. Tony is looking agitated and earnest all at once.

“It’s – “

Steve wants to connect. Re-connect, if you will it.

He reaches out and his hand closes around Tony’s arm. He looks relieved for a second and then steps in, encircling Steve’s torso with his other arm, leaning in.

Steve shivers, and returns the embrace. Tony smells like his old self; that too over the top cologne, shaving cream, ginger ale, coffee beans, this week’s hair product, burned iron and engine oil.

“I miss you, Steve,” Tony admits.

Steve closes his eyes. He can hear the quick beat of Tony’s heart; feel his pulse. Steve lets a hand cup Tony’s jaw for a second, two of his fingers stroking the dark, shiny locks of hair around his hairline, and Tony lets him.

Steve can recognize a kiss when he gets it, and still he doubts if it even happened. It felt so soft on his jaw, so fleeting that it could’ve been everything else. He looks down at Tony, who’s looking away, his insecurity showing through his old mask of nonchalance.

Steve blinks once, before deciding. The hand on Tony’s jaw directs Tony’s face up towards Steve, and Steve leans in, softly pecking Tony on the lips. Tony blinks up at him, and Steve’s never looked at Tony like this, so close-up without danger breathing down their necks. Tony looks mildly confused for a second, and Steve’s hand urges Tony forwards again, and this time Steve kisses him for a longer time, but not daring to do it anymore deeply than a meeting of lips.

He pulls back, and Tony shivers in his arms. It’s weird to have a guy like Tony feel so small and vulnerable in his arms.

“I’m not ready,” Steve admits lowly.

Tony looks up at him and then down, looking only slightly shaken. “Of course.”

“No, you don’t – “ Steve starts and then takes a deep breath before haltingly continuing: “I’m not ready to be loved yet.”

“Al – “ Tony breaks off and then clears his throat. “Alright. Then you shouldn’t… pity kiss me, Steve.”

They stand there for a long moment, breathing in each other’s scent. Steve has missed Tony; missed his aroma, missed being close to him. Steve knew from the beginning that he couldn’t embrace Tony like this when he came back; he knew that Tony would suspect something. And then all of those complications happened and Steve –

He messed up it. He recognizes that.

“We’re sleeping together,” Steve admits. “Me and Kan.”

Tony doesn’t look surprised. Probably Natasha. Maybe Thor. “Why?”

Steve shrugs. “We’re lonely.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

Tony sighs and nods. “Since when…?”

Steve catches his eyes. “What?”

Tony looks awfully awkward for a moment. “I thought you only… you were only ever been with women.”

Steve shrugs. “I’m not… straight. I just never…” He tries to find the words. “Allowed myself to.”

“Why?”

Steve can only shrug again. “I’m not really sure anymore. What about you?”

Tony shrugs as well, radiating cluelessness. “I don’t think I really know anymore either.”

Steve smiles sadly and kisses Tony’s forehead. Then he starts to let go. “We will figure something out. I’ll… I’ll talk to Kan about it. He’s… good at helping me. I want to … know you better.”

At these words, he feels a hot blush color his face, and Tony’s cocky grin makes a great comeback after all of these sullen days, though he looks really confused. Steve shyly returns the smile, and they part.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Primer:  
> Referred quote from Captain America vol 1 #228. Not to frame Tony as the bad guy, but kinda unintentionally hurtful to say something like that to someone with a past like Steve's.


	11. Limits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kan looks wary for a second. “I don’t know, Steve. I’m not sure I’m the person you can talk to about this. We have very different ways when it comes to handling things like this.”
> 
> “I can’t talk about it with anyone else,” Steve says in a slightly pleading tone, and moves onto Kan’s lap. “I don’t… You know my limits better than anyone.”

**Now**

In the evening on the second day, Carol begrudgingly arrives to the Tower with Kan in tow. Steve is on the roof, reading a book. The sun is up, and though the temperature is definitely cooler up here than it’d be down on the streets, Steve gets by. He needed to get out of his bedroom, but also go to a place where he knows people can’t reasonably follow him without it looking intentional. When he hears Kan’s voice call out his name, he crankily looks up and feels his hostile frown smooth out when he sees whom it is.

Kan looks like a mess. The hours in isolation have not done him any good. His eyes are frantic and wet, his face pale as a sheet and slightly damp. Exhaustion radiates from his being.

Steve puts down his book and waves, and Kan takes off his shoes and leaves Carol’s side, grabbing a blanket on the living room’s couch. Kan silently lets himself out on the roof, and immediately crouches down besides Steve. He spreads the blanket around their shoulders, huddling them together, and leans his head against Steve’s arm, closing his eyes. He keeps having them closed until they hear Carol walk away.

“Are you alright?” Steve asks, slinging his arm around Kan’s shoulder and squeezing him.

“What if my kids are dead?” Kan whispers shakily. “They –“ His voice breaks. He starts to quiver all over.

Steve reaches out and holds Kan’s shaking, cold hands.

“I can’t feel them through my necklace,” Kan continues. “Anything could’ve happen. What if my husband hasn’t come because he can’t tell me we lost them?”

Steve’s throat closes. If Kan’s kids have also lost their lives…

No. They have to hope for the best.

“It’s probably just dragging out,” Steve starts to reassure in a soothing voice. “Remember? He estimated the danger through numbers, but villains don’t work like that, so he didn’t promise you anything, right?”

“No,” Kan whimpers and he gets tears in his eyes and Steve pulls him in, driving his fingers through Kan’s hair and wiping the tears away from his face. “They’re probably fine, Kan. The best you could do to insure their safety was getting here. You’re protecting them, even like this.”

Kan’s face pinches in a little grimace of misery and he nods quickly.

“Did that thing happen to you?” Kan asks in a squawky voice. “In 1938. At the hospital.”

Oh. Steve feels his stomach turn into ice and become as heavy as lead. He sinks, his throat feeling dry, and he licks his lips. He had managed to forget that, in some way. The red-hot fever, the haziness due to the sedation, Arnie just thinking it was because of his fever. The pain between his legs, Arnie’s frustrated tears when he found out, despite how much Steve had tried to hide it. “Yeah.”

“They didn’t have any right,” Kan shivers, his voice shaking. He’s really out of it.

“They didn’t.” Steve sinks for a second time, and wonders what made Kan think about it. “Does your husband know?”

Kan lowers his head and shakes it softly. “I haven’t told him. For the longest time I simply didn’t remember and then… then I couldn’t bring myself to, first because I…” Kan clears his throat. “I didn’t want him to look at me with pity. It was all a long time ago, there isn’t anything he can do about it. Then the pregnancy came. ‘Hey, we’re pregnant, but for the longest time I wanted to at least die a hero in war, because I knew I was a sterilized man who was going to die young anyway’?”

Steve almost flinches. Saying the word out loud is too much. Too loud.

Maybe it’s what they need.

It does create some kind of solidarity. Kan understands. Kan’s been there too.

At least, now, Steve has that.

“You survived,” Steve says and strokes Kan’s hand. “You overcame your fears and made yourself a family. I’m proud you.”

“Are you?” Kan asks and he sounds half-hysterical now. “What if all I do is because of that prophecy? What if my life is so different from yours, because I never had any choice in the first place? What if I should’ve turned out like you, but wasn’t allowed to?”

Steve looks at him, considering. “Maybe. Maybe that’s why your life looks like this.”

How can Steve tell Kan that he envies him anyway, for finding love, finding peace, settling down?

“I envy you, Steve,” Kan declares and puts his temple on Steve’s arm, closing his eyes again. “I shouldn’t but I do. You’re the version of the man I could’ve become. Your choices let you to become the person you are, and nothing else.”

It goes unsaid what exactly those choices did to Steve.

\----

They wake up in the evening time, when Drew becomes worried and wakes them up. It has definitely become colder, and they have been cuddling underneath the blanket to keep warm in their sleep. They thank her and retreat to their bedroom. Steve makes hot cocoa while Kan lights some candles and turns the heat up. He heats some hot pockets and puts them on the table in between them. As they eat, evening turns into night and the darkness outside looks like a black sea spotted with colored lights.

“Oh my god. Tony? _Tony_?” Kan sputters, looking up from his sketch. “Isn’t he with Pepper?”

Steve frowns. “Oh. Uhm, no. They used to be together, but she left him for Happy, but he passed some time ago… I think Tony got together with her again, but apparently also… hooked up? With Hill. After that they officially ended, I think.”

“Wait, he cheated?”

Steve tries to find something to defend Tony with, and the best he can utter is: “Well… it was pretty casual with Hill, and he and Pepper weren’t official?”

Kan is staring blankly at him. “You seriously like this guy?”

“Stop sounding so judgmental,” Steve hisses and kicks at Kan’s ankle. “He doesn’t even remember now, I got the story from Pepper.”

“Convenient,” Kan venomously comments, but shuts his mouth when Steve kicks him again.

“He’s my friend,” Steve reminds him.

“Alright, it’s at your own risk,” Kan sighs. “So what, you want to fuck him?”

Steve blushes. He doesn’t like crude language, especially not involving things like this. Crude language always diminishes the sentimentality of beautiful things; makes it trivial, like it doesn’t have any value but foul, perverted humor. “I want to connect with him.”

“By fucking him.”

Steve sighs, but Kan’s gaze continues to be direct. Perhaps, confronting this crudeness – which could be a likely interpretation of his decisions – is what he needs to hear. “I don’t know. I was hoping you could help me figure it out.”

Kan looks wary for a second. “I don’t know, Steve. I’m not sure I’m the person you can talk to about this. We have very different ways when it comes to handling things like this.”

“I can’t talk about it with anyone else,” Steve says in a slightly pleading tone, and moves onto Kan’s lap. “I don’t… You know my limits better than anyone.”

“Anyone,” Kan repeats tonelessly, but his hands reach out to automatically start nuzzling Steve’s hair. He sighs. “Well, what do you yourself think your limits are?”

Steve shrugs. “Not being left alone. Being… accommodated. But I’m scared he will reject me, once he finds out that I’m not… I’m not Captain America in bed.”

Kan gets the hint. “But doesn’t he know you as Steve?”

“Yes. But sometimes… I mean… he understands that I am Steve, but also that Cap is a part of me. I’m afraid he’ll look down on me, once he figures out that I submit. I know I’m not weak. I know you don’t think so either. But it’s still a vulnerable spot to put myself in.”

“So… you want to submit, but you’re afraid of what he’ll think about you. Even doubt your role as an Avenger and leader.”

“Yes.”

“What about testing him out?”

“How?”

Kan looks at him. “He could just watch, and then tell you what he thinks about it. He is a scientist; observing will do him good. Or, you know, you two can sit down and talk about it. I don’t know your Tony, but considering his past as a libertine, I’m sure he’ll understand your preferences. It’d be awkward of course, but it’s the most reasonable thing to do.”

But Steve’s mind has already been caught up on the first idea. “Watching would make him learn though.”

“Yes. But he should be talked to about it first,” Kan reminds him.

Steve looks hopefully at Kan.

“You should be glad that I love you so much,” Kan complains and bounces Steve onto his back. Steve smiles up at him, and his hands automatically go to twirl Kan’s hair around his fingers.

Kan returns the smile, and kisses Steve. He doesn’t beat around the bush; his tongue slips right into Steve’s mouth.

“I bought the stuff we talked about,” Kan announces as he pulls back. Steve looks curiously at him and Kan bounces up from the bed and goes to their closet. He finds a box behind their jackets.

“When did you buy that?” Steve asks.

“Carol was called away on the way back from quarantine,” Kan answers with a teasing smile. “Sam had to watch me.”

“You left him or…?”

“Hey, I respect the safety protocols the Avengers have put upon me. Of course he went with me into the store.” Kan’s smile becomes wicked.

Steve makes a face. “And what did he say?”

“I told him it was a souvenir. He didn’t ask further into it.”

“Of course.”

Kan takes off the lid of the box, and pulls up a heavy, but slender silver chain with two clamps attached to either side. The chain is long enough to stretch over even Steve’s torso and still have a few inches left, and Kan pulls up two bundles of rope. It doesn’t feel like sandpaper when he touches it, but they are still a little bit rough. Kan waits and watches as Steve holds and feels the objects. They are not quite strong enough to hold him, and Steve has learned a lot of rope knots by now. But Steve doesn’t worry things will go sideways. He trusts Kan.

Kan silently, but still sort of eagerly awaits Steve’s response. They’ve been talking about it, prepping for it, but Kan is still ready to be turned down.

“Do an easy knot,” Steve instructs and takes off his clothes. Kan watches him for a second, leaning back and looking content as he watches Steve strip.

Steve kneels in front of the bed.

Kan nods once. He makes an easy knot; binds Steve’s wrists together and then uses a few minutes to glue the arms to Steve’s back. Afterwards he gently clasps the clamps on Steve’s nipples, and Steve can feel himself become hard as the feeling of the sweet bite of the clamps’ teeth overrides his body, makes him shiver and get goose bumps. Like a cherry on top, Kan attaches a metal ball on the chain and the sweet bite becomes vicious.

Adjusting Steve so he can rest against the bed should he lose his energy, Kan sits on the bedside with his knees on either side of Steve’s head, caressing him soothingly as he thinks. They already put limits down, and the more they start play the more rules they add, but they had both quickly found out that spontaneous free style excites them the most, as long as Kan remembers to tell Steve exactly what he is going to do, before he does it, so Steve can have time to safeword, or if his mouth is occupied, tap his fingers.

“I’m gonna fuck your throat,” Kan says.

Steve nods and Kan walks on his knees, letting Steve lick the tip of it for a long time, making Steve lick and swallow his balls, before seriously starting to suck it. It’s warm and familiar in his throat, and he quickly falls into a good rhythm. When the sucking goes easier, Kan starts to step up his game and start to fuck Steve’s mouth. Steve tries his best to not scratch with his teeth, and swirl his tongue around the thick shaft, but after long enough time, his head starts to become heavy with the tilt it makes everytime it’s entered.

“You know what you’re good at?” Kan asks, his abs starting to sweat now, the pearls of it rolling down his skin. His pubes mostly catch it, but Steve can smell the strong, damp smell in his nose, taste it slipping it under his upper lip and into his mouth. “Making room. You see most guys, even my husband, have a hard time taking all of me. My cock stops at the back of their throat. But you. Mm, you are so good at – “ Kan snaps his hips and Steve feel the head of Kan’s cock slip past his uvula, past the tight closure of his tonsils, and down his throat.

Kan is still hard as a rock, and his cock has a hard time bending down into Steve’s throat, instead mostly hitting the back of his mouth.

Kan pulls back and then thrusts in again, and this time gets down into Steve’s throat, almost entirely blocking Steve’s airway. His eyes start to water and it makes Kan growl, look down at him with dilated pupils.

“There we are,” Kan praises and slaps Steve’s hollowed cheek. “That’s a good boy. That’s a good boy. Can you feel that?”

Kan hooks a hand between Steve’s chin and neck and presses. It makes Steve choke and Kan groan. “I can feel myself in you.”

He pulls out and Steve gasps, crumbling and looking down, and Kan smacks his face again, directing it towards Kan.

“Did I tell you we were done, Stevie?” Kan snaps and Steve quickly shakes his head, straightening up to look Kan in the eyes.

“Now, do you want it harder?”

Steve thinks of his burning throat, his aching jaw, his shivery shoulders and the spit rolling down his chin. “No, Kan.”

“Wrong answer,” Kan replies, slaps Steve, and directs his dick back into Steve’s mouth, harder now, more directly and Steve feels his head get dizzy from the air deprivation and the constant rattling motion of his head. His eyes roll back and he has never felt this perfect, this complete, just from feeling high on being used. Who would he have become if he knew years ago, that destroying himself would fill him up with such euphoria.

Kan slips out, kneels down and gets eye contact with Steve and calls: “Steve? Steve? Color?”

“Green, green, god, Kan, I need more, I need – “

“You don’t get to make demands,” Kan barks and slaps Steve again, this time repeatedly until Steve’s eyes are streaming and his cheeks are throbbing with a dull pain. When he’s done, Steve is even dizzier and Kan orders: “Find my dick and put it in your mouth.”

Steve is confused for a second, but then he lifts his torso from all the pillows and starts nuzzling and licking at Kan’s crotch, finding the head of his cock and trying to make it go into his mouth.

“I’m gonna hold your nose, Stevie,” Kan warns and waits until Steve hastily nods, before two of his fingers pinch Steve’s nose and he moves in. Now Steve is pretty much not breathing and his whole body is convulsing, tensing, and Kan just ruthlessly pounds his throat, until Steve’s eyes are stinging and he can’t even feel his arousal anymore, his body is just a mess of chemical reactions and he’s no longer sure if he’s pushing forwards or trying to pull away, but Kan keeps his head close anyway. There’s nowhere else to go, nothing to do but receive this.

It’s liberating.

Kan pulls out and Steve looks up at him and Kan’s eyes become awfully soft. He strokes Steve’s hair and slides his fingers around the inner side of Steve’s lips, testing if there are any cracks.

“Can you swallow, Stevie?” Kan asks, kissing Steve’s used lips.

“Yes. Yes.” His voice is awfully rusty, almost sounding like it’s still choking.

“Color?”

“Green.”

Kan gets up on his knees and when he gets close enough to touch, Steve’s upper body falls into Kan’s thighs. As he tries to straighten, he can feel that he has been too affected by the scene to really put his strength into it. Kan holds his head there, pushes in once again, circles and grinds his hips, his groans coming louder and quicker now. Kan feels pleasant and on the edge, and he looks up at Kan with sultry eyes and Kan grinds and grinds, his head thrown back, his chest heaving.

When he comes, Steve knows it’s coming and still he isn’t prepared on the come spurting directly into his throat, making him choke and cough. After Kan has finished coming, the taste of his semen strong on Steve’s tongue, Kan pulls out. He kneels down in front of Steve, wraps an arm around Steve’s shoulders to keep him grounded, and grabs for his dick.

“Aw, Steve, you’re so wet and you still haven’t come for me?” Kan coos, touching Steve’s dick and Steve flexes, feeling oversensitive and used and hungry. “Such a good boy. Such a good – “

Kan takes off the little iron ball on the iron clamps, and the sharp painful grasp lessens into a mild ache, leaving Steve’s nipples feeling burning and throbbing. Steve gasps, goes “Slowly, slowly”, but he screams anyway when Kan carefully unclenches the clamps. Steve’s nipples sting and feel raw and painful in their exposure.

“- boy,” Kan finishes satisfied. “I will give you a reward. What do you want?”

Steve spreads his legs invitingly.

“Actually, no,” Kan gleefully announces and Steve whines loudly. “I’ll let you be worked up for a while, and if you’re good, I’ll go get Tony. I might even let him go bareback on you.”

Steve throws his figure around, whining louder and Kan just giggles, laying himself on Steve’s chest and closing his eyes. “You were so good for me, Stevie. The way you took all of me, the way you didn’t break. You’re such a good boy.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> primer:  
> I'm pretty sure his beginning romance with Pepper and then sudden affair with Hill is from Invincible Iron Man: World's Most Wanted. All you need to know basically, is that Tony started a romance with Pepper, before running away with Hill and starting an affair with her.


	12. Come in

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony throws his head back and as Steve lowers to take him in his mouth, Kan returns with a bottle of orange juice. He sips it lazily as he stands by the door, buck naked and they have eye contact as Tony’s dickhead makes way into Steve’s throat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no longer have a beta, so if you want to lose time betaing aimless smut, hit me up.  
> Otherwise enjoy.

The next morning, they skip their morning run and instead have a long talk stretching up to 45 minutes during breakfast. Steve gives him a burner phone in case Kan wants to call during his talk with Tony, they have a round and then Kan takes the elevator up to Tony’s apartment. Steve showers, knits, and looks up the Irish children’s books their mother used to recite to them as children.

Kan speaks the Irish language fluently, having had their mother for a longer time than Steve did. It had been brought up unexpectedly, while Steve talked to him about being raised at the orphanage, and then Kan had somehow gotten it into his mind, that Steve should relearn the language. It’s not that difficult; grammar and primary verbs and substantives have stayed with him, but most words haven’t. It’s all a manner of relearning, and with the serum, learning languages are like spreading butter on pieces of bread.

However, like many things lately, the Avengers don’t seem to like them conversing in a language they don’t know with an accent so heavy even the translator would have a problem distinguishing the words.

When Tony finally does come, Steve is still flying. He’s lying on the bed, naked, simmering in his afterglow and there’s a knock on the door.

“Steve, it’s Kan,” Kan announces, creaking the door open, until the space is big enough for the two of them to have eye contact, but so narrow Tony can’t see anything. “I brought Tony.”

Steve sits up. “Come in.”

Tony looks highly-strung, nervous and jittery. He’s still wearing a suit from this morning’s meeting, and Steve smiles encouragingly at him. Tony tries to smile in return, but ends up looking down at Steve’s body instead.

It should be rude, but there’s something endearing about it. Steve has, of course, always noticed Tony looking, but Tony thought he was being really subtle about it. They all think they’re subtle about it. Steve has even caught him directly several times, and Tony would always distract him with a cheeky comment.

But now Tony is looking at Steve’s body, the hunger evident, the need rising by the moment. And Steve.

Wants.

He’s tight again, but besides that, the lube is still shiny on his inner thighs and his nipples are probably swollen. Steve should be nervous, meeting Tony like this, but instead he feels safe, and at best, slightly excited. Steve’s in his safe zone. He will never caught being nervous here.

“Tony’s using protection,” Kan curtly informs, while getting rid of his clothes. It’s annoying how he obviously just wants to get it over with, but he still looks elegant and confident as he does it. Tony’s eyes barely stray away Steve.

“Alright,” Steve coyly smiles, and then shifts his look to Kan, who gets on the bed and crawls over, sitting in front of Steve.

Kan holds their gazes together, before he softly kisses Steve’s lips. Steve automatically closes his eyes and lets himself be swayed by the way Kan tries to draw Steve into their little bubble with barriers as thick as concrete, into their warm, sunlit daydream, their Wonderland in the middle of a steel and glass building.

And Kan is good, but not that good. While Steve can feel his body getting ready for sex, his mind is still on the quiet unnoticeable voyeur sitting in the chair in front of their bed. Steve can hear Tony’s breathing, can smell his spicy cologne. It’s almost uncomfortable and even though this is what Steve wanted, he’s not sure he can relax enough to enjoy this.

Maybe Kan senses this, because he takes his sweet time warming Steve up. Or maybe he just wants to get Tony hot and bothered, make a good show, but Kan hasn’t really ever cared for Tony so it seems unlikely that he does it for him, so it has to be the first possibility.

Kan nudges Steve’s legs open and the linen slides down from their naked bodies for a second, but Kan quickly straightens it.

“What’s your color?” Kan whispers into Steve’s ear, low enough for only the two of them to hear. “Be honest.”

“Green,” Steve answers huskily, tightening his knees around Kan’s waist and pulling him in further.

Steve tries not to look at Tony, tries not to acknowledge him at all, because he knows that if he sees Tony, realizes his mere presence during what is sacred between Kan and him, then no matter what face expression Tony is wearing it will make Steve safeword and he – he doesn’t want to safeword. He wants this to be good, he wants Tony to… Get it. Understand it. Be here.

Come in.

Kan caresses him all over, and this must be the most boring show ever, but it feels good. Steve’s skin starts tinkling and Kan takes the lube, before he goes down under the blanket, closing his teeth around one of Steve’s nipples. Steve squirms as Kan’s tongue circles his nipples, and gasps silently as Kan’s hands reach up and aid his mouth.

It’s good, but it becomes better when Kan slicks his fingers and starts rubbing Steve’s hole. His legs start shaking and he closes his eyes, small sparks of pleasure going through his nipples and his hole feels like its heating up, until Kan finally slips a finger in. Steve tenses, his breath coming out quick and Kan crooks his finger, touching directly at Steve’s spot.

Steve jolts and moans, his toes curling. Kan bites the skin underneath Steve’s pubes and for a second Steve desperately longs for Kan to use pain like he usually would, and then forgets all about that when Kan adds another finger. The fit is tight, too soon, and just what Steve needs right now and his legs lift and lay themselves on Kan’s shoulder and Kan leans in and takes Steve’s cock in his mouth in one move.

Steve groans and then whines when Kan starts to hollow his cheeks and really suck. His two fingers start thrusting. He’s determined, and when his free hand clenches Steve’s ass cheek, he comes hot and bothered, Kan magnifying the orgasm as he sucks it right out of Steve’s dick.

It’s only when Steve’s back and head hit the sheets that he realizes he was strung out like a bow. He breathes heavily into the pillow, and Kan rubs his hipbones, shushing at him.

He comes out of the sheets, and takes Steve’s cheeks in his hands, kissing him softly. It’s Steve who dips in his tongue to taste himself, and Kan lets him. Steve raises his knees around Kan’s waist, and he feels Kan hard and leaking on his stomach.

“Come on,” Steve urges and directs Kan’s hands onto his knees. Kan kisses his cheek, before taking a hold of his dick, and firmly entering Steve. The further he pushes in, the more Steve can’t help but press his body into the bed. Somewhere Steve can hear Tony’s breathing get hectic, and he focuses on relaxing. He was the one who asked to get as little prep as possible, because the feel of Kan fucking him when he has only been prepped with two fingers is something Steve never gets used to.

Kan waits for long seconds when he’s all the way in. He kisses Steve’s pectorals, cups his hands around his sides, nuzzles Steve’s neck until the tightness becomes bearable.

“Stevie,” he whispers as he draws back and pushes in. Steve throws his head back, gasping loudly, and shivers violently when Kan pulls out and pushes into him again. Kan deliberately aims for his prostate, and once he hits it, he doesn’t let one thrust go amiss. Steve’s moans become louder and shriller and Kan’s hand is grabbing his dick, quickly jerking it as he fucks him and Steve cries out. His voice breaks. He needs. More.

They talked about this.

Steve wanted to keep the naked parts underneath the blanket. This isn’t supposed to be porn for Tony. It’s just supposed to be a glimpse. Steve doesn’t want Tony too see everything, the penetration, and the seed spilling out. He doesn’t want Tony too see Steve so vulnerable.

But goddamn, Steve wants to drop that first plan, and shift positions. He wants to roll Kan over and ride him until dawn. He doesn’t want to give a damn about his limits or Tony.

“Wipe that look off your face,” Kan whispers.

Steve stares at him, breathing quickly.

“I don’t know what you’re thinking about, but you stick to the plan,” Kan says. It sounds like a warning. His cheeks are flushed, his eyes blank and intense. “Yellow.”

A wave of shame washes over Steve. He feels his cock soften a little. He reminds himself that Kan isn’t a tool. Kan doesn’t – never wanted – to sleep with Tony or have him involved in their bed in any way. But he’s doing this for Steve, because Steve is an emotionally constipated jackass who doesn’t know how to talk to people anymore.

Steve nods. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He sits up – which is a really awkward feeling when Kan is balls deep – and winds his arms around Kan’s neck. He pulls him in, and now it’s Steve’s turn to make Kan forget. He kisses the tenseness away from Kan’s shoulders, until Kan is soft in his arms.

Then Kan re-starts his phase. He’s cynical this time. His face expression is focused on Steve, but it almost looks detached. He’s trying, therefore he’s continuing, but Steve knows he fucked it up, he knows he did, but Kan is determined getting this over with, and so Steve can’t bring himself to stop the scene. Kan is a man on a mission, and soon Steve comes all over himself, his fists clenched underneath the pillow.

He doesn’t see or hear Kan come, and when Kan carefully pulls out, he’s still achingly hard.

 

By the time Steve is able to focus again, Kan is soft, rubbing Steve’s quivering thighs with both of his hands, and Tony is keening.

“Is this what you want?” Kan asks Tony and lifts Steven up on his shaky knees, the sheet falling off to expose Steve’s half-hard cock, cum dripping down his stomach. Kan’s hand turns Steve’s face so Steve is looking directly at Tony. Steve can’t help but lean into the hand as his eyes meet Tony’s, can’t help but hum when Kan’s other hand cups one of his ass cheeks and tugs at it.

Tony has a noticeable bulge in his slacks, and Steve looks down at it and whines. “Kan,” Steve says. “Kan, I want…“

“You want him?” Kan finishes the sentence and reaches around to start stroking Steve.

“Yes,” Steve groans. “Please, Kan, let me – “

“Nah,” Kan says, shoving two fingers up in Steve. “I feel like keeping you to myself. I like how in pain he looks.” With these words he roughly fingers Steve and Steve flinches with oversensitivity, even though his cock starts to harden.

Steve can’t help but start to lower down on the fingers, ride them a little, can’t help chasing the pleasure.

“You want him, Stark?” Kan asks. “You think you can handle him?”

“Sure as hell I can,” Tony hoarsely answers with a failed attempt at a cocky grin.

“Well, guess we won’t get to see,” Kan smiles. “Time’s up. You’re gonna leave right now and as soon as you’re gone I’m going to fuck your Captain. I’m gonna fuck him so hard and good, that your name won’t even be on the list of things he’s screaming about.”

Tony glares at Kan, and a little satisfied smile slowly emerges on Kan’s face.

“Kan,” Steve whines. “Please, I want him.”

Kan turns to look at him. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” Steve nods, closing his arms around Kan’s neck and looking him in the eyes. “Please, Kan,” he whispers into Kan’s ear, their sweaty chests pressed against each other. “Please.”

“Color?” Kan mummers back.

“Green,” Steve promptly replies and Kan nods once, before pulling his fingers out and giving Tony room. Steve crawls over the covers to greet him, and Tony, stumbling a little as he walks to the bed, is pulled down on the bed. Steve closes his arms around him, drinking Tony’s desire from his lips while pulling his blazer off. Steve’s clammy hands are moving down Tony’s shirt, fumbling the buttons open. Tony shivers, his hips thrusting slightly against Steve’s naked hip and isn’t helpful with undressing at all, so Steve pushes him down on his back. He straddles the man and unbuttons Tony’s slacks and pulls them and his boxers down to his knees. Tony’s cock – average size – springs up his belly button, red and leaking.

He bows down to kiss Tony again. Tony’s eyes close and Steve lets in his tongue. Their kiss deepens as Kan gets off the bed. Steve bites Tony’s lower lip and runs his fingers through Tony’s thick hair.

It’s good, it’s so good like this and he reaches down to fondle Tony’s balls. Tony’s mouth gapes open, his eyes falling shut.

Interested Steve keeps rolling them in his palm and his other hand goes lower to rub hard at Tony’s perineum. Steve resumes the kissing, sucks on Tony’s tongue and starts to jerk the root of Tony’s dick with two of his fingers. Tony is visibly holding back his orgasm and Steve opens his eyes as they kiss.

“Careful, Steven,” Kan says from the doorway. “His recovery time isn’t as short as ours. Use his orgasm well. I’m going to go get some juice. Okay?”

“Okay,” Steve says and looks up briefly to meet Kan’s eyes reassuringly.

Kan nods and exits the room.

“Can I suck you?” Steve asks Tony.

“Yeah,” Tony agrees, looking gleeful. “Can I fuck you after?”

“No,” Steve smiles. Not really because he minds, but he doesn’t want Tony to have his ass yet, wants to save it for a special occasion. “I will swallow if you come in my mouth though.”

Tony throws his head back and as Steve lowers to take him in his mouth, Kan returns with a bottle of orange juice. He sips it lazily as he stands by the door, buck naked and they have eye contact as Tony’s dickhead makes way into Steve’s throat.

Steve relishes in the feeling of it and Tony opens his eyes to slowly blink at the ceiling, his eyes watery, and Steve reaches down and rubs at his perineum again. Tony chokes and Steve hums and then bitter come (seriously, Tony should stop drinking so much coffee) spurt down Steve’s throat. Steve relaxes his throat and lets the fluid flow down his throat, before pulling back, some cum dripping onto his lips. Just as Tony starts shaking through the aftershocks, Steve tightly sucks on his dickhead and a last spurt of cum comes out. Steve swallows.

Tony’s head falls back unto the covers and he looks so helpless and overwhelmed, with his pants and underwear around his knees, his shirt still hanging around his shoulders. Steve leans forwards and kisses his abdomen, before rolling off him, reaching out for the orange juice.


	13. Perfume

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She was making an… aphrodisiac? To drug Thor?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning! Chapter ahead contains sexual assault, beating and waterboarding. Read with care!

“Strange has located the Enchantress’ cottage,” Tony tells them all in the meeting room, Tony in the armor with the faceplate up. Looking happy and healthy, but stern. “We need as many Avengers on board as possible. I know you’re dying to get out on the field again, Winghead.”

Tony is not mistaken. Steve has become quite restless; not the severe kind that feels agonizing, but rather like he’s getting tired of not being of any use and starting to wonder if he’ll ever get out again.

Steve smiles companionably at Tony, before continuing the briefing where Tony left off in Captain America mode. He already misses the familiar routine Kan and him have built up, but the dark days might disappear if Steve gets out and does his job again. His purpose. Erskine didn’t give him the serum to sit idly at home.

At the end of the meeting, Tony only allows a lingering glance and a slight smirk as a comment from their previous encounter.

“Welcome back on board, Cap,” Sam smiles at him when Steve tells him. He’s trying to catch Steve’s eyes, looking slightly concerned.

He smiles back at Sam, says he’s glad to be back.

Kan doesn’t take the news well.

“What do you mean you’re going back to the field?” he asks, his voice trying to cover its infuriation but not quite managing it, getting up from the bed to look down at Steve with crossed arms.

“It’s almost been 3 months,” Steve says, looking up at him. “I’m not going to lead on this mission anyway, I’m just backup.”

“You haven’t been on the field for 12 years, Steve,” Kan reminds Steve in a low voice.

The words are probably well-intended, but they still feel like a punch into Steve’s confidence. “And you know our memory is eidetic, it’s not like I’ve forgotten anything,” he justifies coolly. “Besides, Zola kept me in shape over there.”

Kan glares at him. “Steve, I really don’t feel like you should be on the field.”

“You think I can’t do my job?”

“Who are you fighting?”

“You know I can’t tell you that. Now answer the question.”

To Steve’s powerlessness, Kan doesn’t answer right away.

“Kan?” Steve asks. This is the part about Kan which irritates Steve the most; Kan has none of Steve’s directness when the truth is needed, and is rather tactful, has a way of wrapping it up in ribbons and rainbows to make it softer. He’s unnecessarily diplomatic, and at times, his silence reminds Steve of T’Challa’s secretive intelligent demeanor.

Kan sighs, looking ashamed for a second and then embarrassed then sad. “Steve, your clothes doesn’t even fit you properly anymore,” he sighs at last and almost distantly grips a piece of Steve’s T-shirt. It used to be tight on him, but now it’s hanging off him. “I told you your eating habits had to…”

His voice fades.

“Please, Steve,” the doppelganger pleads. He looks fine himself, his cheeks red in a way Steve hasn’t seen in the mirror for a while, body relaxed and strong and everything Steve isn’t right now.

“No,” Steve says and when Kan just stares at him in silent mortification, Steve repeats it, stronger: “ _No_.”

Kan looks like he’s ready to cry.

“I can’t stay here at home all the time, Kan,” Steve says. “I need to do something. I know you might feel like you need to be on the field too, but – “

“It’s not that, Steve,” Kan morosely interrupts. “Well, it’s not only that. I’m happy to get you out more, there are only so many _The Kardashians_ reruns we can watch, but –“

He shakes his head and looks so full of worry when he meets Steve’s eyes. “Just promise me you’ll be alright.”

He utters it so sincerely that Steve can’t help but let the anger give away. “You worry too much,” he states softly and reaches up to Kan’s cheek. He finally notices that his wrist isn’t usually this narrow. “You’re just missing your kids and having someone you can boss around and be endlessly worried about.”

Kan gives him a crooked, half-hearted smile. Steve’s not sure what he’s so afraid of.

\---

It starts with Thor and Tony’s plan. Steve sees the holes, but he gets worried that Thor and Tony might doubt his capability if he makes a fuss, so he only very carefully picks up some loose ends and looks out of the window as he says them out loud.

They don’t prod at him afterwards and he doesn’t regret mending; last time he walked half-assed into something, he got stuck there for 12 years. But he knows they view him as oversensitive right now and he doesn’t want them to doubt his competence.

And then, of course, one hour into invading her cottage, which have no corners, no windows and only a few doors the team gets separated. First they lose Sam and Jennifer, then Valkyrie and Hercules, and it continues like that, until it’s only Thor, Steve and Tony working their way through. They find Sam and Iron Fist, only to suddenly be thrown through thin air, as the hallway tilts and swirls and then the walls are closing in on them, and Steve gets knocked out.

When he wakes up again, Tony is talking. Steve can’t make sense of the words. He forces his eyes open and feels his head get clearer as he senses someone – or something - pulling at his boot. He tries to lift his head, and make sense of Tony’s rambling. His vision gradually gets sharp, and through the throbbing pain in his head, he notices that on his side, chained to a wall, Thor is knocked out. After a second of dizzy inspection he realizes that he too is in chains. They’re all – him, Carol, Tony, Sam, Thor, Hercules, She-Hulk, Iron Fist, Janet, Ben - chained to the wall, thankfully not hanging, but just some fair meters away from each other. Tony is missing his armor. And there’s no technology in the cottage. Steve’s attention snaps back to his boot, when the person pulling at it succeeds in getting it off, almost dislocating his ankle on the way.

It’s Amora. Her skin looks almost as green as her clothes, which reflect the light in the dim room, her green eyes glowing. She throws his boot to the side, and he realizes the other foot is already bare.

His scale mail is on the floor beside him too, and he’s not wearing an undershirt today. He’s bare. Only now does Steve realize that Tony is cursing at her, threatening her. The room is almost black with darkness, but Steve can sight a metal tub a little distance away, honey-colored walls. He looks hazily up at her as she tugs at his belt and cleanly rips it over.

“What are you doing?” he slurs. “Stop.”

He lashes out, but it’s times like this that he forgets she’s an Asgardian and he might as well be hitting a wall.

“Where is that fool?” she asks nobody in the particular as Steve starts to kick at her. “Making me do the dirty work myself.”

 

“Amora, let go of him,” Tony pleads. “I swear to God, he hasn’t slept with Thor.”

 

 

Dread fills his stomach and he remembers Jane Foster, Sif, the women Donald and Thor have been in love with. It hadn’t gone them well, when it came to Amora. He had just assumed, because he was a man, because it was just a fling, that…

 

It was foolish of him. He knows, thinking about it seriously now, that Asgardians don’t care about gender. God, he’s so stupid.

 

“Why does thine Captain appear so full of fear then?” she asks Tony.

 

“Let go of me,” Steve shouts, and she unbuttons his pants and pulls them off his legs, leaving him only in his underwear and cowl. She proceeds to take off his cowl as well, then underwear, until he’s sitting completely naked. He feels terrible and vulnerable and naked, and it shouldn’t bother him, he’s been in worse situations, but the cold air pins him with needles of fear. She drags him across the room over to the tub, and he’s so sweaty from struggling that he slips right over the edge and into the dry bottom of the tub. The chain, only a meter long a second ago, has lengthened, and the socket of it slips over the wall until it right above him, the chain decreasing in length again.

 

He stares up at her, refuses to show his fear, and she disappears in the darkness for a second.  
  
“Steve, it’s going to be alright. The others will wake up any second now,” Tony insures him, though he sounds so anxious his words almost lose their power. “And I sent out our coordinates before she took my armor, help is coming.”

 

Before Steve can answer, Amora is back with a huge tray littered with pots, bowls with powder, flasks and flacons. He hugs his legs, clenching his arm to pull at the chain, wanting to use it as a garrote once she gets close enough, but the chain abruptly lifts his arm up, until his ass almost looses contact with the tub. Amora lifts up his chin, and he is forced to meet her eyes. She has a deep golden pot in her hand and she pours the content right into his forehead. It’s sweet and thick and slimy and he belatedly realizes that its syrup. His lashes glue together as the golden liquid flows slowly down his face, his chest and below his hipbones.

 

He pulls his head loose and bites down as hard as he can on her hand and she screams as her skin breaks and blood comes out, filling Steve’s mouth with a sweet, metallic taste. He feels blood drip down his chin, but before he can accompany his bite with a punch, she hits him so hard over the head that he passes out again.

\-----

He wakes up because he can’t breathe. He jolts, breaks through a surface of water, and continuously coughs and heaves up bitter-tasting water. As he gasps for breath, trying to clear his lungs, he realizes it was all not just a nightmare; he’s still in the tub, which is filling up gradually with blue, purple and pink water, striped with marble-like golden veins and peppered with petals looking eerily a lot like moth- and butterfly wings. It’s too pretty and Steve kicks his legs, ruins the patterns and swaps water out of the tub, and somewhere in the room, he hears Amora’s exasperated sigh. 

“It’ll be easier if thou stay still, Captain,” she lectures.

  
“Steve, please, just do what she says,” Tony adds, but he doesn’t sound like himself. He sounds tired, like he’s been talking for a long time. Sam is awake now, but he looks drowsy and Jennifer and Hercules are fighting their chains. Steve suspects that Iron First is faux sleeping. Ben and Carol are looking conscious, but barely and Janet is nowhere to be seen. 

“What are you planning to do with me?” he asks.

“A simple perfume,” Amora informs, maybe hoping that once he finds out he isn’t getting killed he will cooperate. “If I wear it, mine love will finally recognize me as his true loved one. I could use him now, but I want to be sure of forever.”

She was making an… aphrodisiac? To drug Thor?

Steve kicks his legs again and she hisses, before stalking over to him.

“What’s so mighty about thou anyway?” she asks.

With those words she grabs his neck and ducks him under the water, and he’s struggling though he knows he should spare his air. He knows, but the panic grips him, makes him scared out of his mind. For minutes it isn’t Amora holding him down; it’s Zola, Zola has him, Zola has his boy, Zola is killing them both all over again.

  
It’s his fault. He should’ve been better.

Her hands loosen for a moment and he rips himself loose, thrusting up to the surface, gasping for air. She looks mildly annoyed at him. He has never seen her engage in physical fights, but right now she’s all wet with purple water. The water carries a stain, he sees, as her clothes have become blue. The petals are all over her neat clothes. It fills him with satisfaction.

He stares defiantly up at her, knowing he can’t escape because of the chain around his wrist, but he can still try to stop this perfume from being made. She glares down at him and whacks him over the head. The hit makes him dizzy and she grabs his face and slaps it with the palm of her hand. He grunts with the pain and gets another slap for his efforts, and she keeps going like that, slapping him with the force of the Rhino. Soon his cheeks are red and swelling up and his fingers have scratched the surface of the bathtub so hard his nails are cracking. But half of the tray’s ingredients are still unopened. It fills him with motivation.

Finally she drops him and he refuses to slump, but his spine is shaking as he tries to remain sitting up. His face throbbing with pain, he stares at the water, which has become red at some point, but he knows for a fact that he isn’t bleeding. She pulls back, and goes to the tray. When she comes back, she puts the mouth of flash at his lips, holds his nose and though he tries to cough it up, not all of it slips down his neck. When the flask is empty, she coos at him, and almost tenderly drives her fingers through his hair.

She puts a hand above his heart, her fingers gingerly rubbing his skin, before her hand slides down to his crotch, groping around.

He twitches and splashes water at her and she grabs his hair and sinks his head under. He struggles against her hand fisting his hair, and hates himself for not having it cut shorter. He can hear various shouts of the Avengers, and he tries to get leverage from the sides of the tubs, but his hands keeps slipping off the edges every time he tries to pull up from the water. Then he fruitlessly tries to beat her off him, and when that doesn’t work either, he decides to fake unconsciousness, so he becomes still.

But even after he has stopped fighting, she doesn’t pull him up and his consciousness tries to slip away when five minutes has passed. Faintly he hears Thor’s voice join in with the others. And there have been days were all Steve could ask himself was “Why am I not dead already”, but right now he is so pissed off about the fact that she is trying to kill him that he fights her out of spite.

Finally she pulls him up, and Steve immediately clenches the side of the tub with his arms, gasping for breath.

And then he realizes that the room smells differently.

It smells like burned paper, and there’s a person standing in front of Amora.

It’s Kan.

He looks so furious that he almost looks blank. He’s wearing a black uniform Steve feels like he has seen somewhere, and a long barbed spear in his hand.

“Get out of my way!” she screams and her hands raise, green thunder coming from her hands. She starts to float and the thunder lights up the room, and then throws itself at Kan.

As Steve shouts, he watches a shield of magenta light raise above Kan’s figure and the thunder peels off it. Steve stares, mesmerized, as the thunder keep coming and the shield doesn’t show signs of cracking. Kan’s necklace is floating around his neck, the pearls purple and black. Oh. It must be part of that magic Kan mentioned.

“You can keep going if you want to,” Kan coldly says. “But one of your libraries is burning up right this second, and I’m not telling which one before you release their chains.”

“I will beat it out of you!” she threatens.

“Sure,” Kan nonchalantly complies. “But look at the soldier in the tub. Even after hours, he’s still not cracking.”

He smiles a little bit, as he knowingly meets her eyes. “You want to start all over with me? Your library will be dust and the fire will have spread before I utter a word.”

She glares at him. He meets her eyes without seeming agitated.

Then she lifts her hand, and Steve’s chain falls off. The same goes with the rest of the Avengers. Most of them jump up on their feet.

“Now tell me,” she demands.

Kan shrugs. “I don’t know what it said on the door, but it’s the fourth door on right hand when you enter from the cube on the north side. Also, I gave Hulk your helper. Hurry. I used gasoline.”

And just as she’s about to raise her hand, probably to relock the chains, Iron Fist springs himself at her.

Kan turns away from the fight as Jennifer and Hercules aids him.

“Thor,” Kan snaps. “Get rid of the tub and its content.”

He takes Steve underneath the arms and pulls him up. Steve feels like he’s only waking up now. Kan snaps his fingers at Thor, saying “Cape”. Thor hands him his cape, and then lifts up the tub.

“Don’t get anything on you!” Kan shouts at him as he exits the room. Kan dries Steve’s body with the cape and then wraps Steve in it. Steve is shaking, his face is burning, and pain from the various hits to his skull is showing its face. Over Kan’s shoulder, the Avengers are fighting Amora, but Steve can’t keep up. The adrenalin and determination are draining out of him; he wants to sleep. Kan’s low reassuring mumbling doesn’t help. He feels safe though he knows he shouldn’t.

“Come on, Steve,” Kan says and pulls Steve up by the arms again.

“You got the coordinates?” Steve slurs.

“Yeah,” Kan confirms. “I’m sorry it took so long.”

“It’s okay,” Steve says.

“Stay with me, Steve,” Kan says slightly alarmed.

Steve straightens and Kan leads them out of the room. Now that Amora is busy, the enchantments on the cottage are gone. Windows and ends to the hallways show up, and too easily they leave the cottage behind and board the Quinjet. Kan takes him directly to the decontamination shower Tony got build into the Quinjet after the green pollen incident and strips the cape off him.

“You need to stand on your own now,” Kan warns, his grip still tight on Steve.

“I can do that,” Steve replies.

Kan steps back, and turns on the shower. He moistens a scrubbing brush with soap and as Steve is soaked, he mercilessly scrubs Steve all over. Steve is leaning into the wall, feeling bugged as hell about all that water, but soon the purple tint disappears from his skin. By the time Kan is pulling him out, Asgardian authority has already come to contain Amora and the Destroyer. Kan impatiently tries to get Steve dressed, but that takes him even longer because Steve might as well be sleeping, and by the end of it Kan rolls him into a duvet.

“Now you can sleep,” Kan sighs and sits down in front of the bench, looking almost like a lifeguard, his body starting to slump.

Knowing Kan is there Steve falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, I can feel us finally heading towards the end!


	14. Burning Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “On your way to Tony?” Steve asks, already feeling agitated, wanting to get this polite talk over with as quickly as possible so he can move on. He struggles to not flick his gaze around, but he does end up glancing at the door, and fleetingly scanning the lobby. “I’m pretty sure he’s up, working with Reed.”
> 
> “Thank you for letting me know,” Black Panther says to which Steve nods.
> 
> “I need to go,” Steve says, already starting to step around T’Challa, when the man gently clasps his arm.
> 
> “Are you alright, Captain?” T’Challa asks. “You seem distressed. I heard about what happened to you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, first off, warning! Steve is in a bad place and makes some decisions he normally wouldn't have.   
> Also, this chapter is unbetaed. Sorry for the slow update, been busy with exams and birthdays, but hopefully i can get back to regular posting.

Steve doesn’t know how it happens, but when he wakes up he’s in his room. He’s wrapped up in bandages and patches, and poking them tells him his body has been sluggishly healing. He sits up. His skin is damp and flushed, and his vision is hazy.

Very suddenly the events flash through him and he curls up in the bed, writhing.

He can’t describe the feeling, which wrenches in his chest and makes him curl together in a ball, but it’s a mix of horror and anger over having being violated. Shame that he feels violated when far worse has happened to him. Dread that the Avengers will never forgive him for this.

Banner comes in and checks on him. Banner does an examination and tells Steve what he already knows. The lack undernourishment his body is going through has slowed down his healing, but he should be good enough to walk around. The Enchantress has been subdued and brought to Asgardian authority. The debriefing has already taken place without Steve. Kan’s reveal of unknown powers have put him right back into quarantine.

Steve takes the news with a blank face, but as soon as Banner has left, he feels his insides churn and break out in fire. Everything hurts and Steve can’t look into the mirror.

Ten pm Steve sneaks out of the apartment and goes to see Tony. He’s desperate – his skin sweating and it feels like every vein in his body is throbbing – but he can’t bring himself to enter.

He’s still bleeding. Still leaking.

Weakness.

And Tony would see, and Iron Man, his Shellhead, his Tony… Steve doesn’t think Tony will want Steve like this. Tony would want him strong, unfazed, like always. After all, that attitude seems to have been what had made Tony semi-attracted to him for so many years.

No. Too many risks. Too much fallout. Not worth it.

Steve turns away. He takes the elevator down to the lobby. Turns off his phone and give it to the reception, but keeps his credit card. He hears the low whisper of footsteps.

He pockets his card, and looks up. “T’Challa.”

T’Challa nods to him. He’s not wearing his Black Panther attire, but a rather crisp black suit. He has to be here to do technical business with SI, then. The suit looks good on him. He’s looking directly at Steve, and Steve meets his eyes.

“Hello, Captain,” T’Challa politely greets. He looks slightly tense, but Steve figures it’s his paranoia speaking. There shouldn’t be any reason for T’Challa to look nervous.

“On your way to Tony?” Steve asks, already feeling agitated, wanting to get this polite talk over with as quickly as possible so he can move on. He struggles to  not flick his gaze around, but he does end up glancing at the door, and fleetingly scanning the lobby. “I’m pretty sure he’s up, working with Reed.”

“Thank you for letting me know,” Black Panther says to which Steve nods.

“I need to go,” Steve says, already starting to step around T’Challa, when the man gently clasps his arm.

“Are you alright, Captain?” T’Challa asks. “You seem distressed. I heard about what happened to you.”

“Yes?” Steve says, but his heart is starting to pound faster and T’Challa’s hand is hot through the layers of clothes, and Steve is desperately hungry for some skin, for some relief and T’Challa is standing in the way, except –

Except.

Steve turns around, and does the same thing he has seen Kan do with Tony: he stands uncomfortably close, curves his shoulders slightly around the figure in front of him, leans in and says: “I’m going out to look for some good company and unless you volunteer, I suggest we part here.”

T’Challa considers him as he lets go of Steve’s arm. Steve turns around and walks towards the door, when T’Challa calls out: “I came alone.”

\----

They drive for a long time. Neither of them wants to be in the city, so they wind up taking the highway and driving all the way to Sprain Ridge Park beyond Bronxville. They park the car in a human bare area, where only some trees and bushes surround the limo.

He parks the car and turns towards Steve. “You have my attention.”

“Do you have condoms?” Steve impatiently asks.

“And I thought you were a gentlemen.”

To which Steve only replies with a dirty grin. He digs some lube packets up from his pockets. He looks up to see if T’Challa has found the condoms, and the king has, has even taken off his blazer.

In return, Steve shucks his leather jacket and shoes. T’Challa gets up from the drivers seat, and goes to sit beside Steve. When they’re both comfortable, Steve uses a moment looking down at T’Challa’s body, weighing him, wondering what makes this guy tick and what makes him shortcut.

He looks up. “I want to top, if you don’t mind.”

T’Challa crowds closer. “I’m not good at bottoming.”

Steve nods. “We can turn it around if it’s no good. Can I try for now?”

T’Challa shrugs and when Steve keeps looking at him, he finally nods. Steve crowds closer as well, and his hands reach out, hesitantly glancing at T’Challa’s covered wrists, before landing on T’Challa’s elbows. The cloth’s texture feels cheap, slightly sandpapery. Steve leans in, closes his eyes and tries to breath in deeply. T’Challa smells of a sweet cologne, with an undertone of musk.

He opens his eyes, his fingers curling loosely over T’Challa’s arms. T’Challa is looking down at Steve’s chest, and then up at Steve again, and Steve leans in. Their eyes meet, and T’Challa brown eyes appear searching. He hesitates, and then finally gets close enough to kiss T’Challa on the lips. The man automatically closes his eyes, and Steve’s glide his cupping hands up, stroking slightly, before settling on T’Challa’s neck and shoulder.

Their kiss deepens. They learn the shapes of each other’s lips, and find a rhythm, and it… T’Challa is really good at kissing, and his tongue is careful, good, his hands clever as they stroke down Steve’s sides, and as T’Challa’s hands settle on the small of Steve’s back, Steve slowly raises himself onto his knees, so he can use his weight to unhurriedly get T’Challa onto his back, his long legs stretching out on the back seats, while Steve’s thighs part around T’Challa thighs.

T’Challa’s hand starts to bundle Steve’s T-shirt in a fist, tugging at it slightly, and Steve pulls back for a second and pulls his T-shirt off by the collar, while T’Challa’s hands find their way to his pants pockets.

Now bare, only the sound of the heater and the rain outside in the background, the sunlight dimmed and gray in the car, Steve’s leans in again and resumes their kissing, while he gallantly unbuttons T’Challa’s cufflinks. His lips wander down to T’Challa’s jawline, biting at the stubby skin for a second, before continuing down to his neck. When he has loosened both cufflinks, he takes a second to get it off T’Challa. Bare skin stretches smoothly underneath him, and he bows down, kissing his way down to the hollow of T’Challa’s neck, licking and kissing it, until T’Challa finally makes a small moan. Steve bites the flesh, before moving down, lapping at a nipple while circling the other with his fingers, sucking it in.

T’Challa’s eyes are closed, his brows slightly wrinkled and his mouth opens in a silent gasp when Steve gently nips at a nipple while twining the other one with his fingers. T’Challa’s lashes are thick and plenty, fanning out like sunflower petals, and Steve can’t resist moving up again, kissing T’Challa’s mouth again.

He takes his time. T’Challa is a hard man to please, and his muscles are as tense and hard as his resolve on positions. But Steve likes foreplay, so it’s not really a problem. He likes buttering someone up, likes rubbing them loose, likes the buildup from caress to groping to clenching, likes the feel of a woman in his mouth, the smell of a man’s arousal in his nose.

When T’Challa naturally seems to unfold his legs, Steve unbuttons his slacks. He waits for T’Challa respond to this, and when the man doesn’t react, he zips the slacks open. He pulls their heavy weight off (they’re definitely armored despite how thin they appear), and goes lower, mouths at T’Challa’s hard cock through the white tight briefs, breathes him in.

“Can I suck you?” Steve asks hoarsely and when T’Challa quickly nods, Steve tugs down the briefs. T’Challa’s dig is thick and hard, with a big head and a vein looking sort of like Harry Potter’s scar. His balls are neither too small nor too big, and they feel tight in Steve’s hand. He swallows T’Challa in one go. He can tell it surprises T’Challa by the way his back arches and then moans loudly when Steve curls his tongue around the head, hollowing his cheeks and sucking. T’Challa moans again, lower this time, and Steve reaches up, pulling and squeezing T’Challa’s nipples, while gradually starting to bop his head. His hand close around T’Challa’s ass, pushing the Wakandan’s crotch up into his wet mouth, so he can knead the fat and muscle there. T’Challa shivers when Steve accidently makes a slurping sound, and Steve purposefully does it again, just so he can feel T’Challa shake.

“Steve,” T’Challa says, his hand momentarily finding Steve’s hair and impatiently tugging at it. “Lube. Underneath the seats.”

Steve lets go of his dick with a pop, which makes T’Challa wring his hips impatiently.

Steve gets up on his knees again, finds the packets and then purposefully arranges T’Challa’s knees on his shoulders. He briefly considers a rimjob, but he’s not really sure whether T’Challa is clean or not and doesn’t want to make it awkward by asking, so he lubes his fingers and instead goes in for an unrushed, but insistent massage, softens and rubs at the muscle and the perineum, and teasing T’Challa by only lightly dipping his finger in. T’Challa groans, while rolling his head, and then startles, when Steve finally inserts a finger. He holds his breath and then whines, and Steve kneels, almost reassuringly licking at the peak of T’Challa’s cockhead, getting the head in and sucking it as was it a lollipop, until he can get another finger in. Now T’Challa’s thighs are starting to tense, and Steve rubs them soothingly, plays with T’Challa’s balls, as he prepares him.

Not a long time goes, before Steve is entering the third finger, and now T’Challa is growling, the heel of his feet stabbing into Steve’s back. Steve climbs up and lays his weight down on T’Challa, so his ass is more spread at the force of Steve’s hands and so Steve can continue their kissing. T’Challa keeps up the pace, but Steve gets the feeling he is starting to wear down, starting to soften, and when T’Challa’s hands finally fall back behind his head, his kiss relaxed and sloppy, Steve starts to finger him rougher and more intently.

T’Challa cries out, and then his voice cracks. He carries on crying out, but not so loud. He moans and gasps in short bursts, and Steve understands Kan, understands the rush of taking control, because there’s something beautiful about this, something that makes Steve grateful. It’s not the same as bottoming, but this is good for now, for Steve to stay in control.

Steve leans back on his heels, pulling out his fingers and rips a condom packet with his teeth. He gets it on, patiently opens another lube packet and strokes it onto his cock, before squeezing the rest of it unto T’Challa’s hole. T’Challa is blinking feverishly at him now, his legs held up and open as Steve does his work.

“Ready?” Steve asks and rubs at T’Challa’s ankles.

“Uh-uh,” T’Challa nods and blinks quickly when Steve starts to press inside.

T’Challa snarls in an almost animalistic tone, his eyes opening up, focusing on the ceiling as Steve works himself inside, T’Challa tight and hot around him.

“Relax,” Steve hums, stroking T’Challa’s temple with his thumb. He holds his breath and holds still and T’Challa covers his face with his hands, breathing quickly. Steve runs his hands up from T’Challa’s ass, briefly around his thick cock and up his chest.

But T’Challa’s body doesn’t betray him, and as soon as T’Challa closes his eyes and very abruptly relaxes his whole body, his ass starts loosening and Steve hums approvingly, bending to kiss T’Challa’s hands and twine their fingers together, very firmly starting to move. T’Challa groans and Steve slows his pace, carefully moving in and out until T’Challa gives more and the ride has become easier with more lube. T’Challa arms are above his head and Steve dares thrust with some power, making T’Challa skid backwards. T’Challa moans and Steve changes the angle of his hips, so the next stroke will hit T’Challa’s spot.

T’Challa cries out and Steve repeats it, keeps giving it to T’Challa in a sweet pace, keeps rubbing T’Challa’s spot until T’Challa outright growls, grabs Steve’s biceps and pulls himself up with his legs around Steve’s waist. It’s so sudden Steve rambles backwards, and the purposeful grind T’Challa gives him only makes Steve surrender to lie down.

It’s a beautiful view. T’Challa isn’t quite sweaty, but he is glistening slightly on his stomach and neck. He selfishly rides Steve, takes what he wants beautifully and Steve finally fully relaxes, watching T’Challa dick bob against his stomach. He must really be sensitive if he’s this hard.

Experimenting, Steve reaches out a hand and strokes T’Challa dick in his palm. T’Challa stills; looking down at Steve with lowered lashes and Steve meets his stare as he starts to get T’Challa off. T’Challa’s head starts dipping, his mouth falling open and Steve takes it as his chance to take control and starts pounding up into T’Challa.

“You’re … ah, keep doing that,” T’Challa groans and without warning T’Challa comes all over his stomach. Steve can tell it has been a while with the seed being thick and white on T’Challa dark abs. Steve can’t resist rubbing it all over, despite knowing how it will congeal soon and make everything itch.

When T’Challa’s hips start shivering like autumn leaves in the wind, Steve pulls out. T’Challa gasps, his shoulders shaking and Steve gingerly re-arranges T’Challa onto his hands and knees. T’Challa claws the leather seats as Steve pushes inside him again, but he’s going slowly now, albeit tirelessly. His hips keep rolling in a relaxed rhythm, and his hands are palming T’Challa’s muscular ass cheeks, occasionally parting them and looking at the hole stretching around his cock.

And then T’Challa makes this small sound, which sounds like a whimper and a gasp at the same time.

Steve groans, and can’t help but squish the meat in his hands. “What was that sound?” he drawls. T’Challa doesn’t react and Steve patiently thrusts his hips forwards, letting his dick slip in deep. T’Challa groans and then shakes his head. Sweat drops hit the seats.

“Hm?” Steve asks again, persistently and let the rolls of his hips continue, just a little deeper and little quicker than before. “Make that sound again.”

T’Challa’s shoulder shake more violently, sweat rolling down the line of his spine and Steve bows down and licks it up, his hips inevitably digging in deep as he does it. He draws it out, until T’Challa starts squirming before he pulls out again, only letting the head of his dick be inside. “Please,” he asks just as he pushes in again. T’Challa jolts before his arms break underneath him and he lands on his chest, fingers curling around the car seats. “Please,” he asks again and quickens his pace, forces T’Challa’s hips still as he just lets himself take and take. “Pleeeaaseee,” Steve moans, slamming in and T’Challa yells out and lets it fade into that whimpering again and Steve can’t help but let his cock piston until T’Challa is whimpering constantly and Steve absolutely loves it, ravishes in greed, his whole throbbing in pleasure and lust and feelings of want and –

T’Challa cries out and jolts as if he’s trying to get away, but instead he’s clenching the car seats, his hips and legs twitching as he spends himself. Sweet, sweet self-fulfillment dazes Steve for a second and then he spreads T’Challa’s cheeks and watches his thick, veiny cock force way into T’Challa’s dark, stretched hole and he looks up, looks at T’Challa’s slightly sweaty sleek back, the curve of his spine, the light reflecting on that rich, rich skin and he can’t help but lean forwards to kiss the back of T’Challa’s neck. T’Challa’s toes curl against Steve’s ankles with the movement and he clenches down on Steve and Steve groans his release, biting down on T’Challa’s neck and thrusting in short, gentle bursts before eventually giving out.

He spends three seconds breathing into T’Challa’s neck, the guy covered with goosebumps and still beneath him. Then Steve loosens his iron grip on T’Challa’s hips, and rubs soothingly at the place his fingers left bruises. He grabs some wet tissues from the glove department and asks: “Do you want to or should I?”

T’Challa clears his throat. He reaches out and takes the tissue, and Steve watches him try to dap away their waste, before he softly pats T’Challa’s wrist and takes over the job. When he is done, he finds a blanket in the back. As it keeps dripping outside, he throws it over them and cuddles T’Challa close.

He smells like sun and desert and the sweet scent Kan’s necklace always bears. His hair is dry and gotten almost as thick as Sam’s and Steve’s thinks nothing of it when he circles his fingertips on top of it, breathing T’Challa’s in and pressing his hand against T’Challa’s hipbones.

He drifts a bit, gets lost in the feel of T’Challa’s heartbeat until T’Challa wriggles. Steve takes a deep breath and promptly forgets what to do in these situations. This is why he doesn’t normally do casual sex. Should he pull away? T’Challa has always seemed like the don’t-touch-me type. Should Steve get up at put on his clothes? Are they just going to spend a whole car ride in awkward silence?

But – T’Challa is just turning around so he can press his forehead into Steve’s shoulder and cuddle closer. Steve automatically reaches up for golden long locks to grab at, and when he finds nothing, he curls his hand around T’Challa’s neck and digs his knee in-between T’Challa’s thighs.

T’Challa sighs and his eyes flutter closed again, shivering and Steve’s hand massage him for long minutes, the knots in his back, around his shoulder, until he reaches down to massage T’Challa’s flanks. T’Challa breathes out while quivering. Steve’s fingers creep closer to T’Challa’s hole, and his fingers dip in to touch at T’Challa’s rim. T’Challa gasps and doesn’t protest, so Steve slowly gets them in again. T’Challa is burning inside, his ass clenching around Steve’s fingers, and Steve sighs, senses for any reaction of discomfort from T’Challa, before he sits up.

T’Challa groans, his hands cupping Steve’s shoulders, and he spreads his legs around Steve’s hips, stroking Steve’s half-hard cock, before sitting up and letting himself sink down over it.

Steve quivers with sensation, his mouth opening in a silent gasp at the feeling. T’Challa takes it slowly, and he looks mindless, sweating, slightly desperate, and Steve comfortingly puts his hands around T’Challa’s waist, holding him until T’Challa is still. He rests his cheek against Steve’s chest, and Steve keeps stroking him, before he slowly starts to fuck up into T’Challa.

T’Challa’s mouth falls open, a low keening sound coming from his throat. Steve kisses up along his neck, as he starts speeding up and he forgets himself. All it’s about is making T’Challa come again, wrenching as many sounds as possible out of T’Challa’s body. T’Challa is slick and loose, agile and willing, and it’s so good, it’s so good pouring his energy into someone like this. He loves seeing T’Challa become more and more mindless as Steve fucks up in painfully slowly, gently, softly, until T’Challa whimpers: “Are you done yet?”

His sweaty face is pressed against Steve’s neck and his thighs and arms wrapped tight around Steve like an octopus, his nails scratching marks into Steve’s skin. Their bodies are pressed together so tight it’s actually really hard to move, but that only makes it easier for Steve to control the rhythm.

“Hmm?” Steve asks, pretending to be dazed and dumb.

It doesn’t fool him. “Are you done?” T’Challa practically wails. “I swear, I can’t…”

“Mmmm,” Steve hums, because this feels so sweet and piercing at the same time, a slow, wonderful peel of pleasure. T’Challa gasps and shakes and Steve can tell he’s getting close. He continues.

“Don’t…” T’Challa says and cries out before his hips twitches, his thighs become even tighter and Steve briefly chokes as T’Challa’s arms cut off his airways. “Don’t play dumb,” T’Challa continues, both his voice and body quivering. “I really can’t come anymore.”

“Oh, it’s not about that,” Steve lies, purring as he does it. He’s sure he can squeeze more out of the guy. “I just love being inside you.”

“You’re a filthy – Ah!” and this time Steve manages to take all of T’Challa’s words away. He continues doing the “Ah! Ah! Ah!” sounds until his head drops back and Steve can’t see his face. He has never seen T’Challa so affected before, never seen T’Challa’s mouth opened so wide with his eyes pinched so much, his legs and waist tensing as he orgasms again. He sounds like he is in pain now, like he is sobbing and Steve pulls back and looks at him.

T’Challa has fallen back onto the seats, loose now and staring up at Steve like he’s afraid. There are honest to god tears in his eyes and Steve knows when enough is enough. He slips out of T’Challa’s, takes off his condom and spends himself on T’Challa’s pubes. T’Challa’s dick twitches and Steve debates going down on him, giving the dick some love, but T’Challa looks wrecked and Steve remembers Kan’s repetitions about aftercare. Considering T’Challa’s oversensitive senses, maybe the way the king is reacting right now is understandable.

Steve picks up the wipes. He clinically cleans both of them, before drinking some water and letting T’Challa drink the rest of it. Then Steve pulls out the blanket and it’s his turn to wrap his limbs around T’Challa like Kan has done a million times and arrange T’Challa on his chest, softly starting to rub at his back and kiss his forehead. Every time Steve’s leg moves, T’Challa whines with oversensitivity and Steve tries to breath as calmly as possible, not letting his supervision show.

Eventually T’Challa’s hiccups turn into gasps, which eventually turn into calm breathing. Steve gives him more water, before sitting in place again, stroking T’Challa’s arms and the small of his back, which must be feeling sore now.

“You felt so good,” Steve praises, kissing T’Challa’s cheek. “Are you alright?”

T’Challa groans in return. “I’m fine,” he mummers. He gets up on shaky knees, his arms wrapping around Steve’s neck. He kisses Steve, and Steve closes his eyes, lets himself succumb to the will still T’Challa displays as he controls the kiss. Lying limb he can only receive.

After a while, they settle and Steve dozes off. He wakes up briefly. He bundles together his clothes and says he’s going for a leak, as he steps outside and puts his clothes on. His wallet is in his jacket pocket and he disappears in the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> T'Challa looks nervous and Tony acts guilty because of the mindwipe.


	15. Hands on me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previous warnings still apply! Steve is continuously circling the drain!   
> This chapter features unprotected sex, Steve consenting while being in a really bad place, also note that Hercules doesn't know the specifics of what happened to Steve so he doesn't fully realize the situation either.   
> And for V-bird, sorry to hook Hercules and Steve up on such a sad note and for my bad writing of the character, I don't really know a great deal about him.

“I’m sorry,” T’Challa says. “I tried to distract him as long as I could, but I’m afraid he slipped away from me. The perfume has suppressed his initial smell, so I couldn’t follow his trail.”

“Dammit,” Tony curses. “Alright. I’ll send Natasha.”

“I’ll send my people. It won’t be long.”

“Better not be,” Tony mutters and hangs up. He looks to the side, and Falcon’s face falls as his eyes meet his.

“We should talk to Kan,” Falcon suggests for the umpteenth time.

“We don’t need him,” Tony snaps.

Falcon’s face tightens in frustration and Tony knows that he is frustrating, but he is not going to trust the man who has twisted Steve around his little finger. Steve wants to convince Tony that Kan is a good man, that Kan is Captain America, but how come Kan doesn’t talk like their Steve – any Steve they’ve ever met really – acts like him, thinks like him. Captain America wouldn’t lie about how strong he was. Steve wouldn’t lie about being invulnerable to magical attacks.

“Yes we do,” Sam firmly but softly disagrees.

“You could be affected by him too,” Tony argues. “And you know the procedure to that.”

“Then send someone else.” A pleading tone is creeping into Sam’s voice. “Come on, just give it a try. It’s better than just locking him into the interrogation room. This has already happened to him, he knows this.”

Tony sighs.

“Think about Steve,” Sam persuades. “Come on, don’t you think I think Kan is freaky as well? But he told us that Steve wasn’t field ready, and this one is on us for not listening.”

“We don’t need to listen to him,” Tony grumbles but when he calls Widow, he makes her go to the interrogation room.

\----

“So?” she asks, when only silence meets her questions.

Kan looks up. His hair hasn’t even become greasy yet. How do they expect her to do her work, when he has only been trapped in here for 10 hours?

His lids are red and eyes as frighteningly blue as Steve’s. Externally he is an exact copy of Steve, except the hair. But there’s also something else about him. Something discreet, knowing. His face is carefully blank in a way Steve never could’ve managed. He carries secrets, heavy ones. And though it too often becomes clear how many omissions Steve contains, Kan is downright mysterious in an unsettling way.

“I must say, I’m disappointed in your abilities,” he finally speaks up, and when he does it’s in a tone that expects to take control of the room immediately. “I thought you were better than sniffing up old trails, Widow.”

She doesn’t let his words affect her, even though she had thought about that plenty of times in irritation.

“You’re not getting anything out of me, unless you want to break the Geneva Convention,” Kan smoothly continues.

“There’s no war,” she harshly answers.

“You thought I’d be here if there wasn’t?” he sharply asks.

She looks at him. This is old news. He stated from the beginning that he was seeking asylum. It’s just so unlike Steve to leave his comrades behind, so out of character. But this wasn’t Steve. This super soldier didn’t even have his shield, his uniform. He was just this longhaired muscular guy with a blank face and cloudy eyes.

“Where’s Steve?” Kan asks.

“None of your concern,” Natasha calmly answers.

“Natasha,” Kan says, and a begging tone creeps into his voice. He sighs, and spreads his fingers on the table, meeting her eyes. They’re so intense it makes her want to step back, and they bring out guilt. If she hadn’t been so busy taking advantage of Steve’s sudden want for sexual adventures, maybe she could’ve focused on reading her old friend better. Maybe she would’ve realized that it was all heading in the wrong direction. She doesn’t feel especially connected to any of the Avengers, but Steve, Sam, Bobbi, Clint and Bucky have special places in her heart.

But she had been foolish. The old crush she thought had disappeared years ago had come back to the surface the moment she had the opportunity to put hands on him. She had known it was a rash move to take him up on the offer. Known it was irresponsible. But Steve had been there in her favorite color dress, tame and innocent, his eyes big and wide as sunflowers. She wanted to adore him. She’d rather abandon her mission than miss her chance. She hadn’t expected that Steve would really be that low. No one had. And now they’re paying for it.

She meets his eyes calmly, not letting her conflicting feelings be shown.

“He can’t be left alone out there right now,” Kan says.

\----

“I told you this wouldn’t work,” Tony impatiently lets Falcon know as they watch Natasha and Kan through the one-way mirror. Tony is sweating at this point, and he’s in the armor, ready to fly anytime now. His panic only grew when he realized that not only did Steve leave his Avengers ID behind – which is so unlike Steve – Tony also watched the security footage. He hadn’t felt it was necessary, since T’Challa was the one who last saw him, but in the footage, he observed how a quivering Steve went to his workshop door, stared at the door for minutes, before almost running out of the building.

“It’s working fine,” Sam answers coolly. “She’s getting plenty of information out of him as we speak.”

“But not the information we need,” Tony says, grinding his teeth.

Sam considers this for a second. “Maybe she’s the wrong person for this job,” he drawls, leaning against the one-way mirror.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Tony squints his eyes.

“That necklace,” Sam says and points at the colorful thing exposed on Kan’s chest. “Why didn’t we notice it when he was hospitalized?”

“Enchanted, probably,” Tony guesses. “Now that we know what to look for, we can see it. It can’t come off, and it blocks telepathic and magical strikes.”

“And do you recognize the design from somewhere?” Sam thoughtfully asks, already sounding like he has a hunch. Instead of continuing Sam brings out his phone and dials.

“What is it,” Tony says, squinting his eyes. He always got along fine with Sam; always liked him, even though Sam was very private compared to Steve. He didn’t like mingling or fighting with the other Avengers, unless Steve asked him to, but when Steve asked for a partner who wasn’t Sam, it was either Hawkeye or Tony, so Tony knew him a little better than most Avengers.

But definitely not enough, since they’re disagreeing so much.

“Hey, T’Challa,” Sam greets. “No, the wings are fine. Can you come to the Tower? No we haven’t found him. There’s just something which craves your expertise.”

20 minutes later, T’Challa is staring through the one-way mirror at their side, fully dressed in his uniform again, so his facial expression can’t be read. Kan has taken to staring blankly at a spot behind Natasha, as she tries to coax reactions out of him. He doesn’t react, but the mask falls a bit in ways, which seems to gratify Natasha. She’s a tough opponent psychologically and she is getting through, but definitely not fast enough.

“We could just import him back to his world,” Tony thinks out loud.

“It’d be unethical to send him into his death,” Sam sharply points out. “And it won’t help us find Steve.”

“No one is hurting him,” T’Challa interrupts, his form stiff as he looks at Kan.

“And why is that?” Sam asks, frowning.

“Because he’s under the authority of the Wakandan embassy and therefore has diplomatic immunity,” Black Panther says, his voice showing no signs of nervousness. 

Sam nods. “I thought it looked familiar.”

“The necklace is Wakandan?” Tony asks.

“Not only Wakandan,” T’Challa starts. “The pendants indicate he has married into the royal family while coming from a warrior class himself. For every year he has been together with his spouse, there’s a pearl added to the necklace. The blue pearls are the years he was given a child by the Panther Goddess.”

“Shit,” Sam curses. “He really is different.”

“So he has, what,” Tony looks through the glass, “five children in 19 years of marriage?”

But T’Challa isn’t listening. He’s walking in there.

\----

“Steven?”

Steve blearily opens his eyes. He’s in…

He doesn’t know where he is.

Looks like a hotel. Smells like a cheap one. Feels like he has been sleeping here for some time.

The fire in his blood has still not been quieted and Steve lifts his head, staring at the door.

It’s Hercules.

Steve blinks and settles his head. He reeks of alcohol. He doesn’t remember where he has been. He doesn’t recall ever having forgotten something. His jacket is on the floor, his shirt smells of sweat and perfume. Squinting at it, he sees small ripped pieces of paper with phone numbers scribbled on them in different handwriting.

“Captain,” Hercules rumbles, this time warmer. He walks quickly to Steve’s side, and takes his hand. “Cassandra came to me with a vision of your misfortunes. I’m apologize, my dear friend. I should’ve come sooner to aid you in whatever way I can.”

Steve meets his eyes, and then can’t help but notice Hercules sink as his nostrils flare. Steve’s eyes lower to his sun brown neck, glistening with sweat. His carved out and bare chest. Those thick, hairy thighs. The arms sized like trunks. Hercules notices his stare, and very bluntly Steve raise his eyes up to Hercules’ lips. They’re pink and soft and don’t seem chapped at all. His stubble could give a satisfying beard burn. And T’Challa’s marks are still on him. Steve knows that Hercules’ handprints could stay all over him all day too.

Hercules shouldn’t have come here. He’s righteous, but he’s bendable. Has bent for Thor too many times for Steven to count. Hercules is a good man, but he has never been good at resisting temptation. Even when he should.

Steve licks his lips.

“In whatever way?” he asks.

For a second Hercules looks confused. But when Steve picks up his right hand and puts it on Steve’s cheek, Steve can see that he’s starting to realize.

Steve entangles his arms around Hercules’ neck and pulls him in.

\-----

“You’re dismissed,” T’Challa nonchalantly tells Natasha. Natasha gives him a dubious glare, before getting up and stalking out without a word. When they hear the doors close behind them, the Black Panther slowly lurks to the chair Natasha had previous sat on and sits down.

“Where’s Steve?” T’Challa directly asks.

Kan’s eyes go from staring at the wall, to staring straight at T’Challa. “You smell like him. You should know.”

“I lost him.”

\----

As their kiss becomes more heated, Steve’s hands fumble to unclasp Hercules’ armor. Hercules’ tongue is big and hot in Steve’s mouth and Steve wants to feel it on his dick, in his asshole, wants to feel it on his chest, on his neck and back, so as the first thing he directs Hercules’ head down to his chest and Hercules moans deeply as his lips close around Steve’s areola and he sucks.

Steve gasps, his eyes scanning the room to find any form of replica for lube, and his eyes land on some hotel products. A lip balm, hangover kit, sweet smelling candles, mouthwash, toothpaste, body butter, massage oil. Maybe this hotel room isn’t so cheap after all. Maybe it smells this way because Steve has slept in here. Steve is the cheap one.

“H-Hercules,” Steve stammers and screams when Hercules’ front teeth close around his nipples razor sharp. “O-on the table.”

Hercules’ eyes land on the massage oil as well and for a moment he looks hesitant, but Steve is humping Hercules’ crotch so hard, that the half-god ends up lifting Steve up with a small cry. Steve cradles his knees around Hercules’ loin.

\----

“When?” Kan asks. “Where did you lose him?”

“Six hours ago,” T’Challa answers, and tells him the location as well.

“I can find him in one hour if you get me out of here,” Kan offers.

“Let’s go then.”

\----

Hercules sucks and bites Steve’s pectorals while he fucks him on the floor. There’s a slight dent in the wall, where Steve got his throat fucked. Before that they settled on Steve tapping him on the half-god’s ankles with two fingers if it became too much. It hadn’t become too much. Steve had lost his voice before Hercules finally came down his throat. After that Hercules easily lifted him up, his thick prick not having softened even a little bit. Steve had wrapped his legs around Hercules’ broad waist, and Hercules had gotten his cock in him and started bouncing Steve on it while standing up. It had been euphoric, mostly because Steve really felt the raw power in Hercules’ body, the power in his muscles and the power on Steve’s body. When Steve had started coming all over them, Hercules had mashed him onto the bed, grinding all over the most sensitive places in Steve. At this point, Steve’s vision has started blackening, and the pleasure is so overwhelming Steve starts to lose his sight as well.

\----

Kan does tries knocking at first. The low groaning sound quiets and then Kan hears someone slurping, a pained groan, and he’s kicking the door open.

Hercules’ face lifts up from behind Steve’s balls. His lips are wet. Stevie’s hole clenches, and his ankles are held up firmly by Hercules’ big hands.

Kan strides inside, and nods over his shoulder while looking in the Olympian’s eyes. “You. Get out of here. Now.”

Hercules gets up, his dick so hard it slaps against his navel. He looks ready to bellow.

“Steve has just been sexually assaulted,” Kan states clearly. “Are you really sure you wanna do this with him knowing that?”

Stevie very hoarsely cries out with outrage, but Hercules looks stricken.

“Get out,” Kan snaps and Hercules turns away from Steve, his dick slightly flagged and walks out of the hotel room. Kan picks up the little clothes Hercules wears and throws it at his retreating back. “Close the door.”

Hercules closes the door. Kan looks at Steve who is now staring at the ceiling. His body is covered with clawing marks and red and blue handprints. Kan wants to scream.

Steve stinks up the car on the way home. He crashed the second they got in the car, and is leaning on Kan, pale and sticky, and Kan’s pretty sure there’s congealed meth on his jacket, spilled, like Steve might have walked into someone while it was still fluid. It’s sickening. Kan feels like puking. He hates and blames himself for Steve becoming like this, though he knows this isn’t his fault.

They have to do a walk of shame when they get to the common floor. Steve’s suite is on the common floor, and T’Challa helps Kan drag Steve’s weight across the living room, more to shield Steve’s hunched figure than because Kan needs it. The Avengers are scattered around, standing still and not offering help and not asking questions. They look like they’re at a funeral. Maybe there is.

“Guard the door,” Kan instructs T’Challa as he takes Steve’s weight inside the bathroom and dispatches Steve in the bathtub.

Kan turns on the water and Steve wakes up at the feeling of water on him. He curls in on himself. Kan takes a minute to adjust the temperature, before he finds a garbage bag. He struggles to get Steve’s shoes off, then his jacket. He empties the pockets first, throwing out the phone numbers and putting his wallet on the sink. Without doubting, he throws the rest of the clothes out. It’s too dirty to being worth saving.

Steve is dozing in the tub when Kan is done. Kan soaps him in and washes his hair, brushes his teeth and even cleans him quite intimately.

“Steve,” Kan calls out softly in Irish. “Can you get up?”

“I’m sorry, Kan,” Steve whimpers back.

“It’s okay, Stevie,” Kan answers and gets Steve on his legs. Steve’s knees are soft underneath him.

“It really isn’t,” Steve contradicts sullenly. He winds his arms around Kan’s neck and Kan gets an arm underneath his knees. Steve is supporting himself to the sink as Kan gets him in a big bath rope. T’Challa is still standing outside the door when they’re done. Steve visibly jumps and curls in on himself.

“Can you leave us for a second?” Kan asks.

T’Challa nods once, and when they hear the door, Kan sinks in on himself. He knows Steve didn’t use a condom. He just cleaned Steve down there himself, because Steve couldn’t move.

“Did you sleep with anyone between T’Challa and Hercules?” he asks Steve as he settles the withering man at the kitchen table and puts a casserole on the stove.

“I...” Steve’s voice fades. “I’m not sure.”

Kan actually turns around. “You don’t remember?”

Steve shakes his head with an agonized expression.

“Hopefully Hercules can’t catch anything,” Kan rumbles, looking at the casserole. He puts some whole milk in it and watches it simmer. After some minutes he adds oatmeal and butter and nuts and berries and whatever he can find in the cupboard.

“You think I caught something during my black out?” Steve asks.

Kan shrugs. “The serum is working fulltime right now. It’s not as efficient as it usually is.”

He finishes cooking the oatmeal in silence. Steve easily quenches his thirst in water, but only sluggishly gets through the oatmeal. When Kan is satisfied, he tugs Steve into bed. The soldier falls asleep immediately. Only then does Kan start to shake.


	16. Black Holes can shred Stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It has gotten ugly. They should've known. It's not like most of them haven't fought depression themselves. But now they do know. They know black holes can shred even the biggest stars.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kan POV.   
> Warning! This chap features Steve's suicide attempt. The description of the scene is vague, but explicit.   
> But I promise this is the lowest we're gonna see Steve.   
> Enjoy!

Steve has gotten to the point where he can no longer justify his sickness. His sadness. He knows the reasons why he’s sad. What should be the reasons, anyway. He doesn’t know anything anymore. Ian’s memory seems so far away. He’s not even thinking about Ian anymore, he’s just… sinking. Drowning. Fading.

\-----

Kan wakes up three hours later, when someone knocks on the door. Steve starts to get up, but Kan puts a reassuring hand on his temple as the door opens. Steve lies down again. He’s too exhausted to care, Kan can tell.

It’s Sam. “We’re getting an extradimensional signals on the platform. Mind checking it out?” Falcon whispers.

Kan’s heart starts to beat quickly as he gets up. “Yes. Can you stay with him?”

Sam nods. “What I had in mind. You go.”

While Kan finds something presentable to wear, Sam changes into some sweats of Steve’s, and takes off his shirt. He crawls into bed, looking unsure but determined, and Steve seems to sense the body in his sleep, since he starts to creep over to Sam.

“He will probably pet your hair,” Kan warns, and not one second too late, Steve reaches out and grasps at Sam’s scalp. He tries to find the long silky locks for a second, scratching at the rough short texture of Sam’s buzz cut, before giving it up and putting his big hand on Sam’s neck.

“Tony’s lab,” Sam informs as he hesitantly puts an arm around Steve’s middle and cuddles closer. “Reed and T’Challa are there as well.”

Kan leaves them with a last careful glance, but immediately speeds up as soon as he has closed the door. He walks quickly through the hallways and takes the stairs three at a time to Tony’s workshop.

When he gets there, all of the screens are lit and Tony, Reed and T’Challa are there. Kan knows all of them weren’t here by coincidence, and couldn’t have possibly gotten there so quickly for the signals. He knows something is up. But for now he must leave it, until he has gotten a better idea of what the Hell is going on behind all of these closed doors.

Kan silently stands between T’Challa and Tony. He doesn’t look at either of them. When he sees Tony he sees a ticking time bomb. When he looks at T’Challa, he can only think that the man is so young and what mistakes his man did in that age.

Kan scans the screens. Recognizing the pattern of zeroes and ones, he picks another screen and scans them all carefully, before he breathes out. This is it. This is everything they planned, they secured.

His husband is finally here, and…

“My child is here,” Kan breathes out.

T’Challa looks at him, but Kan looks at Tony.

“Are you going to hurt them or hold them at gunpoint?” Kan asks straight out, knowing it sounds horrible like that, but he can’t help but make sure.

Tony looks horrified. “No. I’m a dick, but not that much of a dick.”

“Alright.” Kan takes a deep breath. “Please, let them through.”

Reed taps a lot on the keyboard until his code aligns with his husband’s, and then there’s a long moment where they wait for an answer.

When electricity starts to sparkle in the air on the platform, Kan quickly leaves their side and goes outside. Electricity keeps crackling in the air, until a circle of energy appears. The energy swirls like lightning, look like water, and it keeps doing that until a Quinjet starts to appear. As the energy fades, the Quinjet becomes firmer and clearer and when the air shows no signs of the portal, Kan quickly walks towards the ramp, which releases with a click. Taking quick steps at a time, Kan enters the enlightened, small space and hears not one baby cry. He hears two.

“Are you coming?” his husband calls from somewhere, impatience showing through, and Kan goes to the cabin in the back. In there T’Challa is walking in circles with two tiny babies in his arms, rocking them and humming slightly as they cry and scream their eyes out. It varies how much the serum shows in Kan’s children, but they could be anything from one day old to a month.

Kan exhales in overwhelming happiness, and goes to take one of the babies. He knows they were expecting a daughter, but this…

He looks down at the baby in his arms, and big brown startled eyes are staring up at him with trembling lips. There’s a second where the baby is staring at his face and then the child returns to crying, and Kan chuckles as he rests her face over his shoulder and joins his husband’s pacing, rocking his arms. He looks at his husband while doing it, and can’t help but brighten. T’Challa’s uniform looks worse for wear, but it is clean. He has his mask on, but years of experience have taught Kan what he looks like when he is exhausted, relieved and happy.

“You’re late,” Kan mummers as the babies finally quiet down.

“I know,” T’Challa whispers, and Kan reaches out and puts his hand on T’Challa’s jaw.

“I missed you,” Kan whispers and to his horror his voice cracks.

Instead of answering T’Challa leans forward and dips his face between Kan’s ear and neck. For a moment they’re just leaning against each other, careful not to startle or squeeze the babies who might have started dozing off, before Kan shakes and steps back.

“We need to get out of here before they suspect anything,” he says.

He can tell T’Challa is frowning, but his husband doesn’t choose to say anything as they start to walk out of the Quinjet.

Half of the Avengers are waiting outside, and he can sense his husband stiffening, as half of them have shown up in full gear. Kan puts a reassuring hand on T’Challa’s shoulder, before he starts to walk towards them.

\----

When Steve wakes up and asks for Kan, Sam tells him Kan’s lift has come. Something crosses his face, and Sam is not surprised to see relief. Even he had started to sense Kan’s anxiety.

“Where’s Jet?” Steve asks, his voice hoarse.

“On a mission with the Young Avengers,” Sam answers.

Steve nods, and gets up from bed. Sam tries not to look at the shadow of his friend. Tries not to look at the deep line cutting through his cheek; his face shape has, with the loss of the fat, become more like a snake’s.

“I’m gonna shower,” Steve announces.

Sam nods, nervous for some reason. He goes to grab a book on the shelf and tries to focus on reading. But after eleven pages, he doesn’t really know what’s going on or what the book is even about, and so he looks up at the bathroom door.

That’s a long ass shower. These days Steve has taken his time in the bathroom, and today the water is so hot that the fumes are rolling through the door chink.

“Steve,” Sam says and taps the door. “You alright in there?”

“I’m fine,” Steve answers, his voice carefully blank. Is he crying? “I just… need a minute.”

Sam takes a deep breath. He’s been glued to Steve’s back for hours, surely the man wants some space. He knows Steve can be proud, and with the way he has dared to cry in front of Sam these days, Sam supposes it’s not so bad that he wants to lick his own wounds for now. “Alright, call me if you… want to talk.”

There’s a five second silence. “Thank you, Sam,”

Sam’s about to go, when Steve says: “Wait, Sam? Can you go get headbands for Kan? His hair is all over the place.”

Sam nods. “Sure, Steve.”

He puts on his coat and grabs the key. There’s a store not too many streets away and Sam buys some headbands and adds some milk, sugar and flour in the mix. He will make pancakes, with fresh strawberry, buttercream, chocolate and bananas. Steve’s going to love it.

He enters Steve’s suite, and instantly notices that the floor in front of the bathroom has become damp from the fumes rolling out. How hot and long can that shower be?

Sam crosses the hallway in long steps, dropping the plastic bag of groceries and goes to tap on the door. “Steve? The water bill is climbing sky high, man.”

There’s no answer and Sam starts to become nervous.

“Steve, answer me or I’ll kick this door off the hooks,” Sam warns.

There’s a pause and then Sam backs away, makes a run-up and kicks the door close by the handle. There’s the sound of the lock tearing through the wood frame and Sam walks into the room. The air is foggy and he almost slips on the floor as he runs towards the tub.

It’s red. It’s all so red, and through the water Sam can see what will without any doubt be the most horrifying sight he’s ever seen. He shoots forwards, reaching into the water, which looks as thick and pigmented as tomato juice, and grabs Steve under the armpits, pulling him up. Steve’s head bobs backwards as his figure is forced up through the surface, baring the deep cut in his throat, deep and from ear to ear. Sam arranges his shoulders and arms around the tub edge, before grabbing a towel. There are at least 2 liters of blood missing, but Sam can feel a pulse; it’s a miracle Steve hasn’t bled out yet. In the bottom of the tub, he recognizes one of Natasha’s many knives.

Sam shoots out of the bathroom, on the way to calling 911 and then second-guesses it.

If the media found out, Steve would never survive it.

He dials Kan.

\----

It only takes a minute of staring, before the young T’Challa springs to action and starts calling his people to bring baby equipment. Kan watches the process with a held breath, standing close to his husband, who is surveying the scene silently as well, their daughters cuddled up on his chest.

“So,” Tony says, scratching his neck. “I didn’t expect that.”

“I will admit that this took me by surprise as well,” the young Black Panther agrees.

Kan doesn’t answer, only looks down and his husband doesn’t reply either.

“We have some stuff to go through,” Tony says, and Reed and the young T’Challa – who Kan is just going to call the Panther, because this is confusing – look at him in surprise.

But they seem to agree on something silently. Kan checks his burner phone for any updates, and Sam has, dutifully, texted: _He’s showering._

By the time Panther’s people have brought milk for the babies, baby carriers, diapers, and the other three hundred millions things a parent constantly have to carry around when they’re bringing a baby, they’re all seated in Tony’s workshop. Reed, Tony, Bruce, Panther, and even Dr. Strange and Hank McCoy are here. T’Challa meets Kan’s eyes. They’re thinking the same thing.

“So, what’s the story?” Tony starts out, looking at T’Challa. “Your husband has refused to leak any information, but since you’re here I imagine the danger has been dealt with and the Watcher is no longer a prisoner.”

“That is correct,” T’Challa answers. He looks at Kan, and Kan nods once, before T’Challa pulls his head gear off. Only now when the young Panther sits across him, Kan notices how much his husband has aged. The lines are deep around his mouth, his eyes, and on his forehead, and his hair has more silver in it than black. A sore magnificent form of love wells up in Kan’s chest, closely followed by resentment. It’s not that he hates that T’Challa has aged. It’s not that Kan resents the silver hair. He just wishes he had silver hair to match.

T’Challa sighs and rubs his face. It’s littered with small cuts, already having faded into dark lines. His jaw is stubby and his skin is flaky. “Two years ago, Steve was found out to be a beacon, and a direct link between Atlantis and Wakanda. Half a year ago, Galactus and half of the universe found out. Because Atlantis and Wakanda are the top nations of Earth, people thought it wisely to wipe my husband out first, and then target the rest of the planet.”

Stephen Strange’s eyebrow bounces.

“What is a beacon?” Dr. McCoy asks.

T’Challa frowns and then looks directly at Stephen Strange. “Yes, Sorcerer Supreme. What is a beacon?”

They all stare at him now, and Dr. Strange sighs before he raises his hands. With some gestures and quick murmured words, they’re in a bubble of blue light.

“The less people who know, the better,” Dr. Strange explains in a stilted tone. He sighs again, before going on in a more relaxed tone: “First of all, beacons haven’t even been proven to exist. However, they are and have been referred to plenty of times during history, enough for me to take their existence as valid. They’re people, or well, beings. They don’t have to be human. They’re often women. If you’re one to believe in fate, they are mere chess pieces that keep their people alive. If you don’t believe in fate, they are beings who are conveniently placed in the right time and the right place to do something only they can. They’re called beacons because their light leads their people to the future, instead of doom.”

“And, what, Kan is a beacon?” Tony asks.

“A direct beacon,” Dr. Strange corrects. “Direct beacons are someone who have been chosen, and have been given a task. Their task is therefore more legit and more important.”

“I’m a direct beacon, because both Poseidon and Bast signed their marks on me, and put me in a time and place where my actions lead to their people’s survival,” Kan finishes. “If I die, those two nations lose a player. If more beacons die, there’s a big possibility both people will be doomed.”

“And what is a indirect beacon then?” Tony asks, turning his question at Strange. “And do you know them?”

Dr. Strange nods, pursing his lips. “There have been… signs, I have picked up,” he says. “The beacons I know of in New York are Wolverine, Hope Summers, Magneto, Cable, Susan Storm, Janet van Dyne, May Parker, Danielle Cage and Steve Rogers, a bookkeeper in Hells Kitchen, an iceman in Bronx, and so forth.”

Hank looks up in alarm. “Cable was murdered two weeks ago. Wolverine died yesterday. Hope Summers is missing.”

“And Steve Rogers is starving himself,” Tony adds, to the surprise of several people on the table. “He won’t have a lot of time left if he continues that way. You.” Tony looks at Kan. “Did you know he was a beacon?”

Kan bites down. “Yes.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a beacon passing away,” Dr. Strange says. “But if they’re all appearing to die at the same time, we have a problem.”

But no one seems to be in doubt about what the problem is, and the hairs on Kan’s arms raise. He sinks, feeling cold, and there’s a moment of silence before Kan’s phone starts to ring. He closes his eyes and exhales, before picking up. “Hello?”

“Kan, Steve did it,” Sam says and he sounds eerily calm despite the alarm choking him up. “Steve killed himself.”

\----

When Kan arrives with Bruce and McCoy on his heels, Steve is still in the tub. There’s blood splattered everywhere, and his skin and hair have specks of congealed brown blood. Sam has secured the trachea and is pressing down on the wound with a towel. He gets out of the way immediately when Hank lifts him up, and within 30 minutes, Steve is on the medical bay, hooked up to an IV and with his throat sewn together. He’s healing, but slowly. He’s not fading away, but he isn’t stabile either.

Kan sits in the waiting hall, dread filling up his stomach. He feels like he’s going to be sick. He doesn’t know what to do. When his husband calls him, he drags himself to the common floor and as expected all of the Avengers are there. They know. Kan doesn’t know who told them, but he knows they know. They’re all looking to shell-shocked not to.

He doesn’t know what to say. Sam is on the couch. Kan made him go shower after the guy had paced in front of the operating theater for an hour. He’s in sweats and a big T-shirt. His eyes are red and wet and his face is in his hands, his figure crouched, legs spread. Hawkeye is sitting beside him, close.

It has gotten ugly. They should've known. It's not like most of them haven't fought depression themselves. But now they do know. They know black holes can shred even the biggest stars.

“He’s probably gonna be fine,” Kan announces, when all eyes land on him. He should sit down because this is not his place, but no one else is standing up. “However, this isn’t something happening out of the blue,” he continues, looking at Sam who nods and straightens his back to look at him. “We have to be on guard. He’ll probably try again. Next time, we…”

He looks down at their heads.

“Next time we save him,” Kan says. “Not as superheroes, but as his friends.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What did you like and what didn't you like? Is there something you don't quite understand? Sorry in advance, I've been told to be bad at that, but just go ahead and ask, and I'll try my best.


	17. All for love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Sharon’s gonna hurt him,” he intensively tells Sam, staring into his eyes, his hyperventilation turning into dry sobs and deep whimpers.
> 
> “No, Steve,” Sam says and puts his hand on Steve’s eyes like he has seen Kan do. “Ian’s safe. Sharon can’t hurt him no more. No one can hurt him anymore.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've taken the liberty of not changing Kan's name back to Steve, purely to avoid confusion.

Kan walks by his husband’s side, their arms close enough to almost touch. His fingers twitch to intertwine with T’Challa’s, twitch to reach out, but he knows the limits of his husband too well.

It’s been hard, these past years. T’Challa doesn’t love openly and only touches when his heart is tender and singing with love.

Those are rare moments.

Steve touches out of curiosity, interest, comfort, and expression of his feelings. Touching comes as natural as breathing, whereas T’Challa has always been more careful. Been wary. Only touched when he was absolutely sure.

Balancing their ways of loving has been difficult, the two sexualities naturally clashing with each other, but in the end, love was always more important. Love always made them meet each other halfway. Love always made it impossible for them to give up.

By the time they get to their suite, both holding a baby in each arm, their breathing is synchronizing; their hearts are beating steadily, their walk is unhurried and relaxed.

When they’re in their sleeping quarters, they put down their bags and take off their boots one-handed. T’Challa starts the blocking program on his computer, and goes to shower while Kan gives his babies a bottle and tucks them in bed. By the time Kan has taken his clothes off, T’Challa is done washing up and they switch.

Kan takes his time cleaning and drying his hair as T’Challa takes care of the room’s surveillance, and when he comes out, T’Challa is on his computer. He sits up when Kan closes the door and their eyes meet.

And then T’Challa takes a few quick steps, almost clashing into Kan and pushing him up against the wall. Kan groans when T’Challa pulls his hair so hard Kan’s head is tugged back. T’Challa doesn’t kiss him, just sinks his teeth into Kan’s neck.

Kan’s eyes close shut as he rides the maddening pain he has forgotten in his months of stern control, and he grips at his husband’s shoulders, sighing sharply as the blood is drawn. T’Challa finally lets go and looks at the mark with approval, before looking up and drawing Kan into a kiss. Kan exhales, relaxing his hands when T’Challa only radiates gentleness in the kiss.

T’Challa has a wound on his chest. Kan is pretty sure it’s not the standard bullet wound. When he glances at the bandages in question, T’Challa puts his hand on top of it.

“It’s healing,” he whispers.

Kan nods, and kisses his cheek. “What did you name our children?”

T’Challa smiles. “Dafiré and Sapiré.”

Kan grins. Daughters. “Making it impossible for people to tell them apart, huh?”

“Have to keep them on their toes.”

“I love you. I missed you so much.”

T’Challa kisses his mouth. “I missed you too, my love.” He digs a hand into Kan’s hair, and Kan flutters his eyes closed.

It’s a long night. Kan and T’Challa set up the baby monitors, and clean and fill some bottles before they go to bed. They don’t talk. At this point of their relationship, they know when words are not needed. They only lay entwined, their foreheads leaning against each other. Kan can hear some of the night owls of the team rummaging around in the kitchen and in the common area. Unsettled. Restless.

At 2 am, Sapiré starts crying and Dafiré wakes up and mimics her. T’Challa starts twitching, but before he can get up Kan has already left the bed.

“Sleep,” he encourages, and puts a soothing hand on T’Challa’s cheek. His husband is tired as it is. He’s only proven right when T’Challa rolls over and continues sleeping without protesting.

Halfway through the bottles, he realizes that they forgot the vitamin D. For a moment he retraces his steps, before he realizes he left one of the bags in the common kitchen. His husband is starting to stir, so Kan immediately leaves the suite with the babies. Spiderman and for some odd reason, Deadpool, are watching television together, and Hercules and Thor are napping on the loveseat. Clint and Natasha are making pancakes and coffee. He gives them all a long look, before he goes back to his suite.

He drips the vitamin D in the milk bottles and shakes them, before giving them their bottle. It’s not difficult; despite their size, they still have the serum. It was to his and T’Challa’s pleasant surprise that the serum did speed some things up. Unlike regular human babies, his children are able to move the second they come out of the surrogate. Like puppies or kittens they crawl around, searching and sniffing for food, and when Kan gives them their bottles, they hold the bottles themselves while sitting up. Kan watches them in delight. He hasn’t had time to study them properly, too busy pulling the team together.

Like most of their children, they’ve come to the world incredibly light skin. It usually settles when they’re about 1-2 years old. Their 13-year old big brother, Matafi, ended up the darkest of them, darker than his father, with big black eyes and sharp cheekbones. Apparently he looks a lot like T’Challa’s mother. 16-year old T’Channa, Kan’s second oldest, complexion settled on a shade as light as chai latte, and is as freckled as a spotted seal. He has been teased about his freckles a lot, and the red hair he refused to cut didn’t help. There had been doubt about his heritage. But anyone looking at him knew with certainty he was T’Challa’s. He had his father’s brains, his lips, brows and eyes.

Sapiré and Dafiré have dark eyes, as expected. Only Shuri and James are divergent there. Shuri, their oldest child, looked like Kan the most. Not complexion wise. She’s a dark skin girl. But she has big, silky-curly hair, though the last time he saw her, 18-year old, she had it braided. Her amber eyes, her jaw, her mouth are all his. James, 3 years old, has more frizzy hair than her, caramel-looking skin and big blue eyes, matching Steve’s as well. Sarah, 10 years old, has curly brown-blond hair, and cinnamon skin.

Kan had thought about his children endlessly while he was stranded. Recalled their picture. Tried not to imagine their faces with blood on it.

Sapiré drops the bottle. Dafiré looks at her and then does the same. They laugh and wave their arms.

“You two don’t get any funny ideas,” Kan reprimands, his tone fond but stern. “It isn’t time to play now.”

They disagree.

He burps them and when it’s apparent that they’re not going to bed – another side effect of the serum: they don’t sleep as much as regular babies – Kan takes them to the suite’s living room. They crawl around and try to put everything in their mouths, while Kan texts with Sam. The babies are very good with each other, and Kan grumbles because he has a feeling that because they have shared everything, even the zygote, it might mean that his little shit of a husband probably faked the baby pictures.

When it’s 3 am, Kan hoists on a twin baby carrier and goes to visit Steve. Sam is sleeping in a chair, so Kan goes to bring him some tea. His daughters keep waving their arms at each other, so Kan puts them on the carpeted floor and it’s not long before Sam becomes their mutual target.

“Those Rogers,” Sam complains but immediately picks them up and bounces them on his knees. They laugh at him and drool all over his shirt.

“We can’t help it,” Kan smiles. “We just need a piece of that Falcon.”

Sam smiles faintly, and looks at Steve, before he asks: “Is their name even Rogers?”

“In the States, yeah,” Kan replies and makes a face, getting up to rearrange Steve’s duvet and clean some imaginary dirt off his milky face.

“And you?” Sam asks. “Do you have T’Challa’s name in Wakanda?”

“The royal line doesn’t really have a last name,” Kan says. “It’s complicated.”

Sam nods.

Kan promises to change shift with Sam as soon as he has put his daughters to sleep, though Sam declines. “Carol is up after me.”

So he gets his girls to bed, and falls asleep. 7 am the sun is up, and so is his husband.

“Good morning, hubby,” T’Challa greets in front of the coffee brewer.

Kan closes his arms around him and kisses the back of his neck. “Good morning, Mr. Rogers.”

They turn on the baby monitors and enjoy their coffee on the balcony. The sun is on its way up. The days are getting shorter. Winter is coming.

When the coffee cups are empty, and their monitor still aren’t making a sound, they just lean against each other and try to remember what it’s like not to miss each other all the time.

And then T’Challa starts humming the old sweet melody and Kan can’t help but start to smile. T’Challa pulls him on their feet, and Kan hums along to their anniversary song. The dance is slow, intimate. It’s a dance they’ve had now 20 years in a row. Sometimes late, but never postponed. They swirl like petals on water, move around each other easily. This is their moment, and it has never been so quiet. They’ve changed over the years in some ways not for the better. But it’s theirs. It has always been theirs.

And finally, the necklaces start to glow. The pearls become drops of the sun. They’re cocooned in light, and T’Challa pulls up a little box.

The pearl is purple. The year they were given twins. They pick one up, and slide it onto each other’s chain.

“Happy Anniversary,” Kan whispers.

“May the Panther Goddess grant us another year,” T’Challa finishes and they kiss and make goodbyes with their 19th year.

\----

“So,” T’Challa clears his throat, and his tone of voice tells Kan the peace is over, and it’s time for a late debriefing. “What’s up with the hair?”

Kan shrugs. “So they could tell us apart.”

“And the name?” T’Challa asks and when Kan doesn’t answer, he sits down beside him.

“Steve,” he says and for a moment Kan doesn’t react, doesn’t realize that T’Challa is talking to him, and then it’s too late to react. T’Challa is frowning.

“Yes?” Kan tries.

T’Challa sighs and shrugs. “I was thinking if we should get the Hawaiian for the other Steve. Take the edge off, get him through the worst.”

Kan looks at him, and then lights up in a smile. “Why didn’t I think of that?” He kisses him. “You genius. But how are we supposed to get it?”

His husband squints his eyes, scanning his face. “How have they been treating you, since you have so little trust towards them?” he asks. “I thought we could just ask them – or more specifically, me – for a ride.”

Kan shrugs. “Panther – this one here – has been fine, but I only got to meet him a couple of days ago.”

As they listen to the breathing of their daughters, T’Challa patiently waits. When Kan doesn’t answer, his husband straight out asks: “Have they hurt you?”

Kan shakes his head. “Three hours of interrogation when I left medical, and some misunderstandings just before you got here. Otherwise it’s only been suspicion. Steve’s rough patch began when I got here, so they thought I caused it.”

“What is up with Steve?” T’Challa asks and for a moment Kan’s throat closes up when he reminisces what Steve has gone through the past two months.

“A lot of stuff happened to him,” Kan murmurs. “I told them – and him – he wasn’t field ready. But they sent him on one anyway, and it was. Amora.” T’Challa starts to tense, and Kan puts a reassuring hand on his arm. “Not all of it got to happen. Alright? Deep breaths. It stopped right before the perfume was completed.”

Kan’s throat closes up.

“She didn’t get so far,” he continues. He remembers his own mission – the tub. The Destroyer’s arms around him. The humiliating process of making the perfume. How the tub of perfume had abruptly become acid at the snap of her fingers.

“After that,” he says, clearing his throat. “It just all… spilled.”

\----

Drew is on duty when Steve regains consciousness on the third night. He wakes up thrashing, still in a night terror, eyes red and bloodshot, his lips cracked and his face pale. She holds him down as he screams in rage and anguish, and it’s not long before Sam is alarmed by Carol and walking in there.

“Ian!” Steve keeps screaming, staring at Drew but with no comprehension in his face. He’s trying to fight, but his strength is weakened, and his movements are slow and clumsy compared to what they usually are. Still, Carol looks like holding him down is hard. “Where is he? Where’s my son? Where did you take him?”

“Steve, relax, wake up,” Drew groans, holding his chest down with her hands. “You’re in medical, you’re gonna hurt somebody – “

“Sam!” Steve exclaims when he sees Sam coming through. “Sam, you gotta get to Ian, he’s all alone –“

“Relax, Steve,” Sam sooths in his most calming voice. “Ian is safe.”

“No, no, they’re gonna hurt him, Sharon’s gonna – “

“Ian is sleeping,” Sam lies and the pinched, grim look on Steve’s face loosens a bit. “Remember? You put him to sleep in his room. He’s fine.”

Steve’s eyes flicker to the door and then to Sam’s face, and Sam prays he can’t see the lie, prays that Steve’s trust in Sam is big enough. “No, he can’t – I want him here beside me, he’s afraid of sleeping alone – “ he starts in a rushed and panicked voice, which has hushed down at bit.

“You’re cuddling him,” Sam says, and tries to drench up a dry, mocking smirk, tries to find some humor to color his voice, tries to sound teasing. “He’s a big boy now. He can sleep alone.”

Heaving, Steve stares at him for long minutes, before he collapses down on the bed.

“Sharon’s gonna hurt him,” he intensively tells Sam, staring into his eyes, his hyperventilation turning into dry sobs and deep whimpers.

“No, Steve,” Sam says and puts his hand on Steve’s eyes like he has seen Kan do. “Ian’s safe. Sharon can’t hurt him no more. No one can hurt him anymore.”

When Steve has fallen back into his deep sleep, Drew and Carol have already disappeared.

Tony is in the common room, looking like a wreck, when Sam comes in and Sam just doesn’t have the energy for this. His best friend tried to kill himself and it was Sam’s fault, Kan could be leaving any second now (Sam knows, objectively, that Kan wouldn’t. He loves Steve just as much as Sam does, but Sam is still afraid Kan will opt out and leave and make Sam carry all of these broken up people, who are supposed to be a team) and he told Jet yesterday. He told her that the man who promised he’d take care of her, has tried to kill himself. He knows that Steve only did it, because he knew Jet was acclimating. She has already gotten friends, gotten a job at a florist, and has started going on missions with the Young Avengers. She would be fine on her own and she took the news calmly. Still he knows that she’s worried and she’s coming.

And through all of this, Tony has hidden in his workshop. Falcon knows that Tony is broken up. He knows Tony blames himself, and Hell – maybe Sam blames him just a little bit too. Tony should’ve known. He _did_ know, he just refused to see it, and how in Heaven would Steve ever acknowledge that part of him, when Tony of all people, didn’t.

But Sam’s not gonna fall into that cycle of blame. He’s not. Tony can’t be responsible for other people. He knows there’s nothing Tony could’ve done in the end either way.

“A son?” Tony welcomes him with a voice boiling in outrage, and to Sam’s dread most of the Avengers are present. Normally it’s a rare day when most of the Avengers are gathered, but they’re still here, standing around, not knowing what to do to help, waiting for something to punch perhaps. Steve was always the spine of moral support. He always had some great speech, some way to pull the team together in hard times. And where Tony would normally do that too, Tony is too affected with shock and grief to get himself together.

Sam walks right past him over to the coffee machine.

“You knew,” Tony whispers, now quietly and betrayed. “You knew!” he shouts.

“Yes, I knew!” Sam shouts right back, and then doesn’t say anything. When it’s been minutes, and Sam is just staring at the coffee machine brewing up the black liquid, Tony continues: “Say something!”

“It’s not my place,” Sam growls and turns around, just to see that several people are standing up and looking at him too.

Carol, Thor, Spiderman.

“Please,” Tony whispers, and all the fight has gone from his voice. He looks old. Tired. “I’m so tired of all these –“ Tony’s voice breaks. “All of these secrets.”

Sam takes a deep breath and puts his face in his hands. And then he pulls up his phone.

“Who are you calling?” Carol angrily asks.

“Kan,” Sam snaps.

“Why do you need to call him?” Carol shouts.

“Because if someone should tell, it’ll be him!” Sam yells back and now his voice is shaking as well. “Don’t ask me to start giving Steve’s secrets away.” His eyes get wet. He shakes his head. ”He has so many. You have no idea. So I’m calling Kan. Kan knows and gets Steve in a way we don’t. He has been Steve’s support system for two months now. So when I say I’m gonna call him, don’t test me.”

They don’t say anything, just look helpless and Sam calls.

Sam calls, and Kan picks up right away.

“He woke up, Kan,” Sam reports, tries to sound calm but humanity is slipping through. “Can you – “

Before Sam has finished the sentence, the door to Kan’s suite is open and Kan has hung up. He comes walking fast, pulling a shirt down over his head and then freezes when the whole rooms turn its attention towards him.

He looks at them. Assessing. In the beginning Sam hated that look. How Kan always looked at all of them. Silent. Knowing.

“Who’s sitting with him?” Kan asks but doesn’t look like he expects an answer. “Hello, Tony. I’m happy to see that you came around.”

“Shut up!” Tony automatically snaps, but Kan doesn’t look like he hears him, just looks at Sam.

“They know,” Sam tells. “Steve had a night terror, talked.”

Kan nods, doesn’t look surprised. “Let’s all sit down for a moment,” he suggests, and the command in his voice is not stealthy. He doesn’t wait for any of them to do it, just sits down at the couch and looks at them in expectation.

When they’ve all sat down, Kan asks: “How old do you think I am?”

No one is stupid enough not to see where he’s going. “You look 25,” Spiderman obligingly answers. “But we wouldn’t know.”

Kan nods. “There are things about Steve which are crucial that you don’t know. You have to accept that now. When I tell you that his depression didn’t begin with what happened to Ian, you need to not question him or me about it. Understood?”

Hesitating and reluctantly they nod.

“My husband is 55 years old,” Kan informs. “I’m 50. My husband ages and so do I – just so slowly it practically doesn’t matter. Steve and I got frozen for at least fifty years, but for those who knew us, we came back indifferent. We’re bound to new beginnings. Time and place shift and we’re lost. We’re constantly adapting. That does something to you.”

The persistent beep of the coffee makes him get up and get three coffee cups. He silently distributes the hot drink, and then gives Clint, Sam and Tony a cup each.

“At some point you lost Steve without knowing it,” Kan continues. “To you it was just a moment, but for him it was a long time. He waited for you, but needed to adapt. He forgot. He forgot a lot of things. We need that to start over.” He frowns. “Sometimes starting over is the best thing we can do. Do you understand?”

“You’re still not telling us who Ian is,” Tony says.

Kan turns his head and looks Tony in the eyes. “He was 12.”

Everyone hears the past tense.

“No parent is supposed to bury their children or abandon them,” Kan finishes and gets up. “If you have more questions, I advise you to ask Steve himself when he’s strong enough for it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, this chapter was so hard to get out.


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The flood comes in.
> 
> The flood never forgives.
> 
> It never forgets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter the Incursions will be dealt with in a very non-canon way.

“I’ve set up the equipment in Stark’s workshop,” T’Challa tells, stuffing the pacifiers into his daughters’ mouths and tucking them into the fleece blanket. “We’re leaving in twenty minutes. Will you be alright on your own?”

“Of course,” Kan replies. He’s lying on his stomach with Dafiré on top of his outstretched arm, already dozing off, with Sapiré curled in a ball in the hollow of his back. It’s 6 am in the morning. “Is Bucky and Natasha still in Antarctica or…?”

“No, they moved their location to South-Africa. They thought they were being followed and wanted to be on the safe side.”

Kan nods. As the children’s godparents it had been Natasha and Bucky’s responsibility to keep the children safe while Kang was doing his whole witch hunt thing. Kang didn’t see the children as targets, but both Kan and T’Challa wanted to be on the safe side they weren’t kidnapped to become bait, even though that wasn’t Kang’s style.

T’Challa bends down and kisses Kan’s cheek, before he leaves the suite. Kan sleeps for an hour more. Thankfully T’Challa gave their daughters a bottle and changed their diapers before he left, so Kan has around two hours to kill before they wake up and will want to play.

He skips his morning run to go check on Steve. He’s sleeping, his eyes puffed and his lips dry and cracked. Kan takes a moment to moisten his face and lips and clips his nails, which are still growing as quickly as his hair. Kan strokes the jaded soldier’s hair for a second, before he gets up and goes to Tony’s workshop.

As T’Challa promised, his equipment has been set up. There hadn’t been time to bring and establish an interdimensionel connection before, but T’Challa had made sure that Kan could talk with his children after all this time.

Tony is sitting at his work board, pretending not to see him. Beside him stands Stephen Strange, looking very concerned.

Kan turns on the equipment and a hologram screen flickers up in front of him. The minutes are long as Kan waits for the connection.

The first thing he sees is a short afro of dark blond hair, and a brown forehead.

“Sarah,” Kan calls out and he can feel his eyes get wet as his lips stretch out in a grin. “Sarah, my girl, wake up.”

He observes her oily eyelids blink a couple of times, before she looks up with big brown eyes. Then she smiles. “Dada!”

“Hey baby,” he says and he sounds choked up. “Why did you fall asleep in front of the computer?”

“I had a vision,” she tells him and giggles. “I knew you would call. I came here first!”

He shakes his head. “Do Natasha and Bucky know?”

She shakes her head with a mischievous grin. “No! I wanted to talk to you first!” And before he can softly reprimand her, she whines: “I miss you, Dada! I want to go home! When are we going home?”

“Soon, baby,” he shushes. “Dada and father have to take care of some things first, and then we’re coming, okay?”

She pouts. “Tomorrow?”

“I don’t know yet. Do you?”

“No,” she says and promptly starts crying. She had always been a clingy child, and it is wholeheartedly Kan and T’Challa’s fault. Her special needs had given her their constant attention, and she was used to getting her way and not at all used to them not being there for such a long time.

To Bucky’s credit, she cries for 20 seconds before a door in the background is swung open and the lights are turned on. He sees Bucky’s figure come abruptly closer, shirtless and wild-haired. He picks her up and shushes her, while looking down at Kan, squinting.

“Hey Buck,” Kan greets and Bucky stares before kneeling.

“Stevie,” he says, eyes widening and a smile starting to appear on his lips. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Kan replies but can’t help glancing over his shoulder. Tony and Strange are staring at him. “She fell asleep in front of the computer,” he chastises.

“Yeah, you didn’t tell me you had a vision, sunflower,” Bucky says, poking her in the side.

She looks up and rubs her eyes, her mouth turned downwards and a clear voice exclaims in the background. There’s snot and tears on Bucky’s collarbone but he hardly seems to notice.

“Is that Dada?”

“Shuri!” Kan calls out, and a sleep-rumpled Shuri shows up on the screen. Soon T’Channa is by her side and Matafi is awakened as well. It’s hard to answer questions and reassure five people at once, and Kan manages, though they all quickly pick up on him postponing when he’s coming home.

“Just hurry, alright?” Bucky says. “Natasha’s gotten five gray hairs and hasn’t even had time to dye them because of all of you.” He directs the last sentence at the children.

“We’ve been nice!” T’Channa exclaims in outrage, and unimpressed Bucky lifts a brow.

“You’re more troublesome than Steve was in – “

“ – 1938, at the queer bars!” Shuri finishes, rolling her eyes. “Yes, we know.”

“Tone,” Kan chastises and then gets a message from Sam that Steve woke up. Kan wants to catch him while he’s awake and talk about the medicine before T’Challa comes back, and he looks up. ”Listen, children – “

“I’m 18,” Shuri interrupts.

“You’re my baby even when your hair has become grayer than Aunty Natasha’s,” Kan teases. “I have to go. I will call you this evening, alright? Go to sleep, and stop causing trouble. T’Channa, I’m looking at you. Don’t think your father didn’t tell me about the carrier.”

“It was just a carrier,” T’Channa grumbles.

“It had rockets. James was in it,” Kan comments. “Matafi, I’m glad you’re learning control of your powers.”

T’Channa looks away, while Matafi preens. The rockets had been flawless, but James had started crying – for Joseph’s sake, he was only two – and Matafi had forcefully brought it down with his telepathy.

He asks for a big kiss and hangs up, but then the baby monitor starts making noise. Kan goes to the suite, and walks them around a bit. He decides to just bring them. Sapiré is wide awake, and Dafiré will wake up without her sister anyway.

Steve is still coherent when he comes. He looks up at Kan and frowns.

“I thought you left,” he says and then coughs.

Kan stares at him. “You were waiting for me to leave to do this?”

Steve blinks sleepily and then closes his eyes, not answering the question.

“I have a proposal,” Kan says, rearranging Steve’s bangs so he can at least stare up at the ceiling. He puts the girls down on Steve’s stomach, and the soldier grunts, but his arms automatically come up to encircle them so they won’t fall off.

In surprise he looks up at them. “Is that your sixth?” he asks in surprise.

“Turns out to also be my seventh as well,” Kan smiles, can’t help but let his tone swell with pride and joy. “T’Challa wanted to keep it a surprise.”

“T’Challa, huh?” Steve asks, but doesn’t seem surprised. He sits up a bit, and starts to play with the girls in a curious and careful manner. “What’s your proposal?”

“Well, actually I have two.”

“Shoot.”

“You take the medicine we’re getting you to get you stronger,” he starts. “When your body is strong enough, you and Jet and maybe Sam will come – “

“No.”

“ – to my dimension. And you will stay there and get therapy and not have any responsibility on your shoulders for a while. When you can bear it, you’re allowed to return to this universe, if you want.”

“You know that will never happen,” Steve rejects.

Kan is not above pinching a man in a hospital bed. “You need a break.”

“I had a break for 12 years,” Steve grumbles back.

“Yeah, fighting to keep you and your son alive in a dystopian wasteland, controlled by a mad scientist and his cruel experiments,” Kan argues.

Steve’s face pinches. “Don’t talk about him.”

“You need to process this,” Kan continues. “It’s gonna boil over again. You left this place – these people – in pieces because of this.”

“So I should pull them together,” Steve suggests. “If I have to do anything, I have to get better.”

“You do realize “getting better” isn’t going back to suppressing things, right?” Kan asks.

Stevie looks away.

“You remember the asthma cigarettes?” Kan asks.

“Yeah, the ones with nightshade in them?” Steve asks. “Hard to forget. Arnie used to force me to smoke them, and didn’t understand why I kept pointing at empty spaces in panic.”

“Good times. Bucky used to put me on the fire escape to sleep it off,” Kan grins. “Well, the medicine we’re giving you isn’t half as bad. My husband analyzed the components and they should be the same as in my world. It’s just a sedative, which makes you binge eat before you sleep.”

“Fine, but I’m not agreeing to the rest of it,” Steve sighs.

\-----

“You’ve probably put together that you’re not able to see my world,” T’Challa says to Reed, yawning. He looks old and casual in a way the Illuminati haven’t seen T’Challa ever be before, wearing a beige sweater and slacks. He looks well rested, healthy, and relaxed he pours hot black coffee into a green mug none of them recall owning. “And you want to inquire about the Incursions, am I correct?”

After the younger T’Challa had flown them back to the US from Hawaii, he had immediately led T’Challa to the conference room in Baxter Building. T’Challa had followed, and turns out he was well knowing of what was waiting for him.

The table is big, the seats even bigger. They’re the only ones who can fill them right now. They’re tense, cold, tired. They hate sitting here, but desperation forces their hand. It’s not about being saviors anymore, it’s about survival, and the rest of the world, including Steve, should thank them for making this decision instead of them. They might be mass-murdering saviors today, but tomorrow the truth will come out and they’ll be the scapegoats.

“So, how many planets have you destroyed so far?” T’Challa casually inquires, generously pouring coffee up for Tony as well. When no one answers, he looks up at his younger self.

His younger self’s eyes are brown instead of golden, his pupils round and his nails are just nails, not claws.

“Three,” Panther answers him, meeting his eyes. “Two of which were populated.”

They don’t say they let someone else do the dirty work for them. From the outside they’ve feigned horror, but secretly they feel relieved that they weren’t the ones to have done it in the end.

“The reason we’re out of your radar, is because we’re in cosmos, like several other dimensions you probably haven’t been able to detect either,” T’Challa explains. “Cosmos and chaos are the two components keeping realities together. Of course, just calling them cosmos and chaos would be oversimplifying. They’re the binders holding realities together.”

“How did you manage?” Panther asks.

“We made a deal with cosmos,” T’Challa says, now looking at them all. “You’re gonna lose no matter what though. You’re not ready.”

“We’ve destroyed two planets,” Tony chokes. “What could possibly be worse than that?”

T’Challa measures him with a calculated stare, before leaning back. “You think you’re prepared to be the bad guys, to be the martyrs sacrificing their goodness to keep the world alive. Cosmos doesn’t work that way. For the exchange of what they have to give, we had to give something back of equal measure. It’s impossible to sheer out the burden, because no one knows what’s going on except you.”

Instead of explaining their confused stares away, he picks up his tablet and turns it on. A few swipes bring him to a video journal of sorts.

The first one is Kan falling down from the sky, unclothed in winter, besides a pair of pajamas pants, hair long and fluttering in the wind as he dives. Iron Man takes flight from behind the camera and grabs him midair. Kan is hospitalized in the Tower’s Medical Bay, barely breathing, and his heartbeat weak. Tests show his brain is intact, but he doesn’t wake up.

When he does, he screams for three days straight. They have to sedate him when he makes no sign of stopping.

“He later explained to me, that he hadn’t inhabited his body for the six months he was missing,” T’Challa calmly explains. “And he was getting used to senses, thought, memory, sensations, that he was re-connecting with all of his nerves and making a body your body is a painful experience.”

In the next video, Kan is finally silent but not moving an inch. The next one he is learning to walk. Next one he is singing an Irish lullaby until his voice is gone.

“He had to learn to eat, to use the bathroom, to talk, to use his body. He remembered nothing, he was no one.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“To get the true value of what they bargained for, cosmos dissolves them. They do it slowly but thoroughly, layer by layer, until you’re back to your primal state, until you don’t know what having a body or a mind or a soul even means,” T’Challa explains. “Steve was the only survivor. None of the others made it back.”

“Who were the others?”

“Beacons, mostly,” he answers, and Reed’s face freezes. Susan has been confirmed to be a beacon. “Innocent blood. The heart blood of our happiness.”

They look at him for a while, and then Dr. McCoy picks up his tablet. Dr. Strange starts reciting names, and Dr. McCoy finds that many mutant beacons are dead. And so are many human ones.

T’Challa looks across the table, until Tony meets his eye.

“My husband doesn’t ask for a lot,” he says. “He never cared about the money. He never cared about the fame. My goddess is wise. Through all of these years, my husband has saved my country and me time and time again, despite how I know that he can burn powerful men down. Can burn down countries. For every time I made a mistake, he always paid for it.”

“Where are you getting?” Tony asks.

“My husband asked for something,” T’Challa says. “And I have a suspicion, that you did what we did: Deleted Captain America’s memories. Shot the guard dog when it started barking. Insured that the red juice of a broken fruit didn’t dirty his clean hands. I don’t know if he remembers what we did to him. He probably did. And he wants your Steve. I think he knows that your Steve will be the first one Cosmos is going to bargain for. And he wants to save him.”

“We need him,” Tony hoarsely says.

“Maybe,” T’Challa nods, his eyes softening. “Maybe you do in some way. But I am warning you, as a man torn apart by the choices that he made, the choices you are facing right now: Do you want him to pay for your mistakes?”

Something in Tony’s eyes breaks. Some trust, some strength, some kind of determination, seems to break and scatter in this very second.

“If we asked, he would,” Black Panther breaks in. “He’d rather sacrifice himself than let another planet die. All we need to do is ask.”

“I’m afraid it might be too late for making choices,” T’Challa says. “ _Look more closely at your Sorcerer Supreme, young one_ ,” he continues in Wakandan. “ _Is he missing something?”_

The Black Panther slowly turns and looks at Dr. Strange, who lifts his brows in question and suspicion.

“ _He has no soul,_ ” Panther realizes.

“ _His soul was one of the first things to go. His soul is the most valuable thing to him as a sorcerer,”_ T’Challa explains and then says in English: “You have three hours.”

\----

The members of the Illuminati scatter out after making what seems to have been a futile plan, but instead of following after them Iron Man closes the door.

He hands the remote for the portal, and pulls T’Challa up from the chair.

“This time I save him,” he just says, and then T’Challa is flown over to the Tower, where Tony immediately leaves him.

\-----

Steve is stoned out of his mind and Sam is thankfully making sure he doesn’t float and disappear into the sky by holding his arms around him, when T’Challa comes storming in. Jet is playing games on her phone, dressed in leggings and a hoodie, and Kan has already packed their bags.

“Where are we going?” Steve mutters, dizzy as he looks at the busy movement around him.

“Home,” Kan answers, stuffing diapers into the carriers, with T’Challa lifting them up. “Sam, I’m afraid you’ll have to follow us through, are you alright with that?”

“I’m good, as long as I’m back before Friday,” Sam answers.

“Thursday, if it gets bad,” T’Challa answers and looks at Kan, who nods. Cosmos will surely be done robbing beds by that point. “You can come home with the two other interdimensionel travellers who’re stuck with us.”

“Who are they?” Kan wonders, forcing Steve to put on his shoes.

“They were actually heading to this world at the same time Steve and you were doing it,” T’Challa explained. “The portals interfered with each other. Steve and you ended here, but they arrived in our world.”

“Are they dangerous?” Kan asks, and they’re outside now, facing the portal on the platform.

“Not as far as I know,” T’Challa says. “It’s an old female civilian and her son.”

Jet and Sam step through first. T’Challa follows.

“This is a trap,” Steve slurs, squinting at Kan but being too tired and none-caring to bother doing anything about it. “Something is wrong.”

“Yes,” Kan confirms, his eyes pinching together. “Please forgive me, Steve. I can’t let them take you.”

“What?”

Behind them a blue wave of cosmos starts pouring down from the sky. Like God’s flood it pours down on their city. Unforgiving. Unrepentant. It was going to cleanse the city of the sins of men with just too much blood on their hands. And it was looking to take back what was its.

“Kan?” Steve mummers.

“Yes, Steven?” Kan replies, throwing his luggage through the portal and strapping his and Steve’s wrists together, so Steve won’t be able to run away when he realizes what’s happening.

“What did you take?” Steve whispers.

Kan turns around to look at him. “What do you mean?”

Steve bites his lips. “You gave me … a lot. So what did you take in return?”

_People won’t notice you taking things away if you give them something they greed for in return, Steven._

Kan meets his eyes for a moment. Steve’s are soft. Soft meat, dripping with the sweet juice of it. Like broken fruits. And Kan’s eyes are the hard, bitter cores of that broken fruit. “Time.”

They jump.

Somewhere people starts to scream.

 

##  Epilogue

The flood comes in.

The flood never forgives.

It never forgets.

But in Kan’s world? There’s a crying reunion. Sharon, who has become older and wearier. Ian, once a little boy, now a full-grown man. There are Jet and Ian holding hands as they walk underneath the Wakandan sun. There is survival’s guilt, as they learn that Cosmos is tearing Steve’s universe apart to get what it has been promised. But there is hope. Some day they will return. Some day they might be able to make it better.

In the end, there’s a picture of the next chieftain, the new queen of Wakanda, Shuri, holding Galactus’ head in her fist, like her father, T’Challa, once held a Skrull’s.

In the end, there’s a savanna full of Wakandans with bright clothes. There is music and there is one evening when Steve finally accepts an invitation and goes out to the dance floor.

There is a day when Kan and Steve’s eyes meet and they finally don’t envy each other for the lives, which could’ve been. There is a day when they finally become one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [What Kang's witch hunt of Steve was inspired by.](http://66.media.tumblr.com/6473466002e3979c54ca945924e72514/tumblr_nge731qkTz1ti0qr9o1_500.jpg)
> 
> [Concept of Cosmos and Chaos explained.](http://archiveofourown.org/comments/70803799)
> 
> So, the end! What did u think?

**Author's Note:**

> Betaed by the wonderful [Ashacrone](http://ashacrone.tumblr.com/). Without her this would've been nothing :D  
> Drop a comment to keep the author motivated :)


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